the wind is LOUD, the wind does HOWL

Posted on January 21, 2019February 3, 2019 by admin

Selfie in b&W

Today is the Second Sunday After Ephiphany. It started warm and misty. The temperature dropped and dropped. Now the wind is howling. A full moon with a most poetic moon: The Super Wolf Blood Red Moon will be eclipsed in a few hours. If the wind was not howling and the temperature not sooo low, I’d go outside and watch the lunar mass slowly disappear.

Today is the Second Sunday After Epiphany and here is my own little sermon:

Because of the weather the service today at Saint John’s did not have all the bells & whistles some in the Anglican tradition love–incense etc. Mother Shelley preached down in the nave on spiritual gifts. The choir was not there so we had to sing. I was today’s lector and had the great joy of reading First Corinthians. where St. Paul enumerates “spiritual gifts” always claiming they come, but from the “same Spirit.” I grew up in the Pentecostal Church, so I know about Speaking in Tongues. I’ve been to Quaker meetings so I know about waiting until the Spirit moves you (quake). I know that some friends are healers, others seek into the future, others are wise. Still others are

flowers & shells, Captiva Island, FL, 2018

adept at expressing joy.

We are in the midst of a great crisis, the Church for me is a ballast against the the volatility of these times. Without the love of God, my family friends and church community, I could not do half of what I do as a human being on this planet. I am not sure what my spiritual gift is. But I do know why peace is sought, Why quiet is necessary. Why those who scream loudest in the public sphere make the least sense. Do what ever you need to do to find space for your own being’s health and sustainability–the horrors of these times will continue. Find your place of peace and use it to fight for justice and love. Find your Beloved Community.

PEACE IS HARD

Posted on September 11, 2016September 11, 2016 by admin

I sent my brother my extra copy of Of Poetry and Protest: from Emmett Till to Trayvon Martin (WW Norton). He’s thrilled to have it and I am thrilled to be in it. This has been a year where so many Black poets have had to to “yet again” respond to the ongoing violence against our persons and community -vigilantes, police the political elite esp of one party. It’s 2016. Today is the 15 anniversary of the attack on and destruction of the World Trade Center, two edifices that tourists from around the globe seek to see. The irony of that is not lost on me or most New Yorkers.

As I said elsewhere my animus is focused mostly on the men who carried out the attack. They had the opportunity to not murder over 3,000 people. They chose not to. It might have been a matter of belief, but so what. People believe in all kinds of things, worship God or Gods or Goddesses and yet do not kill 3000 people. The event led to many other more horrific ones including America’s invasion of Iraq. Death and destruction continues.

It makes me realize how easy it is to war. To start and sustain conflict and put bodies in place to carry out the orders. The use of drones is just one more measure of the mechanization of this human effort. Whether by a soldier’s hand in combat or hand on a computer screen other humans die. Many other humans.

Peace is hard. Peace is about grown people finding ways to not lash out, not destroy, not manifest rage on somebody else body. And right now few people are ready to wage peace. That the Syrian president-a trained opthamologist is willing to drop chlorine bombs on children tells all of us just how bad the people who wage war want to win. I don’t even know if there is a place in hell for such a “leader”. Or maybe there is a new hell. Peace is hard. And no it will not be in my lifetime that peace will take root, but maybe in my grand nephew’s? I so hope.

Because as LaBelle sang “We need Power” but also “We need love.”

There is a reading of about 15 poets at Jefferson Market Public Library, 10th and 6th avenue, 2-4 p.m. FREE.

Come by. Commemorate.

Not even winter and so much discontent

Posted on November 30, 2015November 30, 2015 by admin

Not since September 2001 has the Thanksgiving holiday been so fraught. The terrorist attacks in Lebanon, Paris, France, Kenya, Nigeria, and Mali on the one hand and the domestic terrorism in Colorado and elsewhere has many of grateful to be lucky enough to not be in harms way when these attacks take place. But it is the ongoing revelation of the criminality of police officers across the U.S. that is so troubling. The murder of Laquan McDonald by a police officer, the released video (there are 4 others) which was clearly tampered with, the year long coverup even as the officers responsible for the death of Freddie Gray in Baltimore go trial and the officer who killed Tamir Rice is still walking around. These are not “bad apples”–these are police officers armed to the teeth who are protect and serve the citizens of their cities and towns, but seem to think that mostly young Black males are unworthy of protection or service. Families across this nation sat around tables dealing with the trauma of these multiple losses and many joined others in protest in Chicago and elsewhere on “Black Friday”. I am too poor really to even deal with shopping, but I was glad to see people locked arm & arm on the Magnificent Mile in solidarity against the #culture of cruelty as Sharon Mesmer puts it. There are plenty of criminals and terrorists killing people, the police do not have to add to the roster (yes this calls for a great deal of sarcasm).

I am thankful for many things including my brother, sister, their children and grandchildren (my many nephews & a couple of grand nieces), cousins, et al and many good friends in the city and around the world. And social media keeps us connected in good ways, but social media brings us very close to actions like the Paris attacks & yes I have friends there, all okay.

When I leave the services at Saint John’s in Park Slope, we ask that the good lord “Grant us peace.” And I so want us to start to demand the many ways possible to make peace more prevalent and sustainable. All of these wars and our participating in them is not getting us any closer. I cannot imagine life in Syria or Afghanistan or parts of Pakistan or Nigeria or even Venezuela, but greater escalation does not seem to be making the world “safer.” Prayers are needed, but so too action. The empty shoes of protesters on the streets of Paris are but one indication of creative ways to say to those in power that THINGS MUST CHANGE and the time is now. Will they? Discontented I leave you. And slightly hopeful.