A Response

Shuffling dinner plates
I hear news of other
plates
having shuffled
in far more painful ways
in places less comfortable than here.
Sadness takes a tectonic turn
toward anger
as I hear those who are blaming you,
the maker of this crusty ball,
for shaking the ground out of wrath
like some jealous child
angry at those who won't
follow your rules.
But in our nondecimated buildings
we know who You are
and we know better
than to think it was you;
It was not your fists
pounding dirt in rage
but your hands, open,
catching many of your children as they fell.
You did not break this world
but only you can heal it.

A New Journal

A new chapter, really,
an analog upgrade
with 240 pages of hope and potential.
As my hand remembers the
feeling of composing words
with ink and metal and paper
rather than keystrokes and lights,
I wonder if we haven't lost this feeling
in other ways;
has email desensitized us to
emotions escritos?
Has this new instantly-global medium
erased
the distances between us
or the us between distances?
the people in the room.
the people outside our door.
Does presence have meaning
when anything that needs to be said
can be said from a thousand miles away?
As I blissfully recall the ease
with which words are strung together by ink and paper
I wonder if friendships, too,
are better strung together by more analog means.

Desesperado

The following is a song called "Desesperado" by Danilo Montero, a famous spanish-language worship leader. I like his music and I wanted to translate this song that has been speaking to me lately. The words aren't especially deep, but for some reason they strike me in a new way as I hear them in Spanish. I tried to keep the rhythm and some of the rhyme, so it should be singable to the origional tune.



I am hopeless and I'm looking for your love
I need you more and more
I want to say to you how much I love you Lord
I love you more and more

And I will walk in your truth,
and I'll run to your arms

Beneath your wings is where I'll be
and I will take your hand

I'll keep myself close to you
With no worries about what might happen

-So that's the song. Below is a youtube video with the song if you want to hear it. It's pretty good.

At the Bus Stop

I think it probably started with the sandals.
An urban expression of a longing
for summer.
An act of anti-autumnal subversion.
But then I think he realized that it was in fact
October
and that, on a clear day, we could in fact see
almost to Canada
and that wool socks would be needed
if sandals were to be worn.
But then again, wool socks do give the impression of
wintertime
and so to balance the outfit
and because he never quite liked the way his
khakis hit his ankles just above the velcro strap
of his sandals
he decided that shorts also would be
a good choice today.

A Saturday Swim

I dive
from my second story apartment
into what appears to be a stream
swollen by Saturday.
People buying orange bags of candy and
light weight coats.
Swimming upstream, I enter through
a long row of bright red mechanical doors
who courteously open for me as I approach
I pause to thank them, then pause again
as I'm not sure about the morays
pertaining to manners toward
electronics.

A job as something other than a writer...

Over the past few years I've become more and more convinced that I want to pursue writing as a career. I've learned a lot about doing that, and most evidence seems to point to this fact: If I'm going to be a writer, I'm going to need to have a real job too.

And now I do.

I started last week as a bi-lingual para-educator in a public elementary school, working with children of immigrant families in Pasco, WA. It's been a good job, but of course a new challenge to my writing that I didn't have before: I can't sit around the library and day dream all day anymore.

I still have a good chunk of afternoons though, and of course Saturdays, so that's what I get to do today. I checked out a fabulous little book called "Valentines" by former US poet laureate Ted Kooser. If you ever find your self with an hour to kill in a public library, I highly suggest it, they are short, very sweet little poems that Kooser wrote for his lady-friends over the years.

He also has a book about being a poet, which I also checked out and will be reading today in between cleaning the kitched, listening to NPR and watching college football...

peace.
Ted

Stories and a Song

I'm almost employed again, but not quite yet, which means I still have had a lot of time to write and work on new project ideas...

I think the best idea I've been working on lately is a set of sci-fi-ish short stories. I say sci-fi-ish because they are mostly set in future or alternate times, but not typical sci-fi. A traditional sci-fi story, in my understanding, takes a basic premise, real or fictional, and shows the way things would be different. What if aliens landed on earth, for example, or what if cars could fly, or what if we colonized mars. The stories I'm working on are similar, but revolving around a premise that is more theological in nature than scientific. The stories themselves would feel a lot like sci-fi, but have theological implications. For example, I'm working on a story about a boy who lives in massive city that is built over the ruins of a 21st century village, and as he is exploring (with his antique GPS) he discovers an ancient book. It then goes on to examine the way a society in the future might view religion.

So, I don't know who all reads this blog, but if you know someone who might be interested in publishing said short story collection, send them my way!

Meanwhile, I've got a few new poems coming out here and there, my book is still selling (to my surprise) and I finished this song for my church. Thoughts?

Our Stories
Written for the Aldersgate Community of Richland Church of the Nazarene

Chorus
These are our stories
stories of sinners and lost sheep
we're broken and hurting
and you , you brought us back
with our friends and our families
to a gym in the desert
You did your work in us
You, You brought us home


Verse 1
Back before we knew You
we might have lived
but not like this
and you started to speak
like a foghorn in the darkness
through Your word and creation
You called us out to You

Verse 2
When we thought we knew You
we were alive
but not for You
and then you started to speak
like a bell in the distance
through the stops on the journey
You brought us back to you


Verse 3
Now we know You love us
You died for us
we live for You
and we will start to speak
like a story being read
to our friends and our family
You send us out for You