Nothing. Nothing. I bring nothing to the table. Nothing.
Skinned knees and weariness, a heart and a smile,
A breeze reading Bukowski, an aftermath after math,
Logical deduction, a postal worker, precision, accuracy,
and application. Left behind in a calming expansion
brought around…decades enduring; faith, hope, and charity,
A reduction, remnants within able to dispense, to dissipate,
to dissect myself reveling within the crowd, a full moon,
The rising sun, a new friend, Peter’s son floating down
The Jordan. A river from the Galilee to the Dead Sea.
Millenniums passing, more than a friend, a modern conundrum,
Here I stand. Here I sit. Here I think. Here I am. Here I let go.
Here I breathe. Here I recede. Here I pray. Here I meditate.
Here I am able to be loved. Unbound, untied, untangled in love.

When Mary weeps, her mother heart
Is full to overflowing:
When Mary weeps, pain’s piercing dart
Stabs Him beyond all knowing,
Who is by sinners crucified,
Blasphemed, forsaken, and denied.

When Mary weeps, God’s holy wrath
Is kindling cruel fires;
When Mary weeps, poor mankind’s path
Leads through war’s blood-soaked mires
And makes all human mothers moan
In love and pity for their own.

When Mary weeps, it’s time to pray
To have our sins forgiven;
When Mary weeps, each night and day
By sorrow must be riven
Until His and her children will
Once more seek peace on Calvary’s hill.

When Mary weeps, we all must try
To dry her tears of sorrow;
When Mary weeps, we too must cry
To glimpse a brighter morrow,
When her Son’s name is recognized
And all in love adore the Christ.

– Father Frederick Lynk

Only the beginning

After the torchlight red on sweaty faces
After the frosty silence in the gardens
After the agony in stony places
The shouting and the crying
Prison and palace and reverberation
Of thunder of spring over distant mountains
He who was living is now dead
We who were living are now dying
With a little patience

…………..

T.S. Elliot

I am wrong about everything,
Social confrontation no longer an issue,
I concede to defeat on every level,
Lost and wounded, I extend my heart,
Bewildered, I step aside,
Without eyes looking, I search inside,
Enough is enough, God alone,
Humbly, I reach out…

There is nothing I have to show you,
To impress, nor to make things new,
Minimalist negation, the silence of hooves,
Pounding, a parade of ghosts, a mental procession,
I broke my back dancing to the edge of the world, babe,
I don’t want to see anything, nor meet anyone,
No refined dinners. No concerts or shows.
No personalities. No global celebrities.
No worldly entertainment. No. No. No.
Repudiation providing a path, detachment, abrogation,
I fell, bruised knees, countless times bumbling,
Meditating, I tried to frame what I saw,
With my fingers forming, no shape nor despair,
Theological virtues: faith, hope, and love,
Cascading, an image of the saint I was not,
Fearfully reciting, surpassing unspoken words, usurping,
Nervous, left to recesses lacking imagination, a multitude of voids,
A bridge forming, built upon breaths, leading away,
Waves coming and going, an undercurrent dispatching to the deep,
Abandonment, disconnected, blocked,  concrete walls dissolving,
What’s that? You can’t hear my whisper?
I can’t speak up, the blinding light,
Darkness enveloping, too much light, I can’t see,
Saturation, a blending, all things converging into rejection,
NO! I will sit still. Aware. I will be still.
Doing nothing, nothing to be done.
Here I am! Allowing, immovable for now,
Answering the quiet, the repeating undefined questions,
I am numb. I am dumb.
Everyone else is clever. I don’t mind,
The shop unattended, motionless,
Within, the mobile spins to its collision.
A life, an identity, a beginning, an end,

Throughout the screaming,
Silence reigns supreme,
Lightning blasts,
And thunder roars,
Winds howl,
And darkness takes hold,
Content within the struggle,
In the eye of the storm,
I sit in peace.