Yo Yo Ma at the Inauguration

Lynn Ungar is to my mind far and away the best poet among the fraternity and sorority of UU ministers. Most of us think if we have a moderately good image and arrange it poem like it’s a poem. Others simply arrange homilies that way.

Not so the Reverend Ms Ungar. She sings…

Sadly her lovely little book Blessing the Bread is out of print. But every once in a while she writes something new.

And here is one!

Yo Yo Ma at the Inauguration

He has to be cold, on the marble iceberg
of those steps, but how could he wear gloves
to touch the lover between his knees?
There is intimacy in sacrifice,
as much as the other way round.
He is beaming – at us, at the day,
at the colleagues who are weaving
through this shared dream. He turns to each
of them: the disabled Jew, the black man,
the brown woman, each of them a genius,
each letting our collective light shine.

This is how we do it, make real the promise
of the day. Letting the love pour through
our fingertips, our arms, our craft.
Gloves off, eye to eye,
giving full measure,
listening
with all the warm intensity
of that wide soul.

copyright Lynn Ungar 1/09