It’s such an impossible Thing to understand that I need to eat magic food To put me in the right head Space to even contemplate Nails nine inches long going Through my hands and ankles; I got a pencil jabbed in my hand In second grade; the lead is still There at about the place The nail hole would have been; Does that count as stigmata? I want this to be yoga; Like you’re up there absorbing All the sins... Read more
She was not manic This time but perfectly Lucid and yet burning With the heart of a woman Who had always been talked over; She didn’t have much To offer the teacher; She hadn’t been trained in Torah; her primary skill was to create An experience using her body And her linen sheets With a light fragrance of Spikenard to help set the mood; And now the voice was telling her “Pour it all on him!” The voice of God... Read more
I. The Party No One Has Time For Heaven is the party no one has time for — Now that hell’s no longer a serious threat. There are far more important things to work on; There are far more important people to be seen with. Heaven is a high school gymnasium with cheesy balloons Where God shows up and waits for a turnout Better than last night when nobody showed. Heaven is a band with a myspace page That gets... Read more
When Jesus sat Twisting his whip of cords Together, how hard Did he bite down With each twist Of the rope As each knot Was firmly pulled Into place? How long from the time He first heard coins clinking In his father’s house Till the moment when coins Were strewn into the dust As wood was splintered? Did he lick his lips When his whip tasted flesh? Does he bite his lip When biblical commentators Reassure their audience That this... Read more
I practiced Zen in my shed today — At first I was only looking for the shovel But then I saw the rust and my father’s tools, And I realized more work needed to be done, And today was the day I had been waiting for: I will take breaks when needed To walk to the trash can To sit on the shitter To drink more water And I will not do everything today But in order to find the... Read more
On the night that Ellis Marsalis died, You reminded me that Music is the space Between the notes. The first three bands I tried to be in Kicked me out Since I overplayed the keys. My mind is always overplaying; Then I oversay the words And overstep the dance And overstay my welcome. A friend told me if you breathe Out in twice the time that You breathe in, It puts on the brakes; But the trouble with breathing Is... Read more
Sangha is a Sanskrit word whose meaning is similar to ekklesia in Greek, the word that becomes church in English. It has been used to refer to any kind of assembly or gathering. In Buddhism, it refers specifically to a monastic community and also the whole community of those who are in one of the four progressive stages of Enlightenment. In my own personal spiritual journey, I have come to a very specific use of the term and there’s a... Read more
[Note: I am doing well and feeling calm, because I write intense poetry like this when I’ve got a lot of angst.] I understand it’s all in my head And I’m the one who made my life Into a video game called middle school Cafeteria where I’ve never been able To kill the boss because there aren’t actually Popular kids who won’t let me sit At their table unless I wipe it down After lunch even though that’s a true... Read more
There was a scandal in early Methodism about Eucharist at some point. I don’t have the date or the exact quotes. Maybe it wasn’t even a scandal; maybe just a clarification. But John Wesley, the founder of United Methodism, once said something like if people who aren’t yet baptized want to receive the body and blood of Christ, who am I to get in the way of their salvation? I think I’m mixing some of his words with some of... Read more
One consistent part of my spiritual journey for the past twenty years has been my use of Buddhist teachers as conversation partners to help me in my own practice of Christianity. I read two books in early 2002 that changed my life: Henri Nouwen’s Life of the Beloved and Thich Nhat Hanh’s Miracle of Mindfulness. It was in the intersection of these two teachers’ wisdom that I found the truth that salvation is the journey to becoming the beloved of God... Read more
Mercy Not Sacrifice
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