OR “THE BIRTH OF HERMENEUTICS”
There once was a dissatisfied couple
whose way with words was quite supple.
An Ermine was he; a Eunice was she.
“I hate being “Ermine,” said he;
“I hate being Eunice,” said she.
With Plato in hand, they looked
and they looked for a new name
to couple the word-supple couple,
so it was that Ermine and Eunice gave
birth to the world’s first Hermeneutics.
NOTE: Read “Hermeneutics” posted moments ago.
Sunday Morning Chimes
Three Church bells ring in Philo,
The Catholic Mass is first,
The Presbyterians
Are next, then Martin
Luther takes his stand.
The steeples point like preachers
To blue sky up above
But storms will soon be coming
If we don’t act with love
And follow that sweet dove.
Yes, Jesus is our teacher,
We hear his bell ring true,
you sound and I am singing
You speak and I speak, too.
Bells ring for me and you.
It’s dark and drear on the way
to Bethlehem where relatives
abound with rooms to spare
to welcome our coming.
Why are the lights all out,
the doors locked, the knocks
unanswered, no candles lit for
us from out of town?
Has news of the coming illegitimate
child scared them off, driven them
way inside bolted doors named fear
and blame and shame?
Has the buzz been mean, the
relatives praying to stay clean
of bedsheets soiled of a bastard
birth and bloody after-birth?
Have the men in town gathered
stones and the women
shrunk back from mid-wifing
Mary’s child into life?
A flop house on the other side
of town welcomes us with fires
outside the barn for black
sheep guests from Nazareth.
after christmas the tree puked
needles the cat even ignored ornaments
the smudgy guilty fingerprints
enhanced the window glass
about two feet up with proof
of candy eaten frosting licked
from fingers and dog nose prints
mixed in for the seurat effect
while good people slept the sleep
of the over-indulged oblivious to the
recent refugees while focusing
on their personal holy family
Detail from Seurat’s La Parade de Cirque (1889), showing the contrasting dots of paint used in Pointillism, Metropolitan Museum of Art
NOTE: I, Gordon, not as well educated as Steve, had to look up ‘seurat’. Click HERE for information on George Seurat, the 19th Century painter known for introducing chromoluminarism and pointillism. and to get the drift of Steve’s upbeat poem. Though not feeling well these days, as noted elsewhere on Views from the Edge and on his CaringBridge page, Steve continues to amaze with his sardonic sense of humor in the face of the eventual eulogy.
Today three close mutual seminary friends from Texas, Arizona, and Illinois meet at Chicago’s Midway Airport and drive to Urbana for a short visit with Steve, Nadja, and their confused dog, Blazer. Blessings and peace to Don Dempsey, Bob Young, Harry Strong, Steve, Nadja, and Blazer.
We were young with no money to show,
But had patience, we want you to know:
We bought Mexican take-out,
And before we would make-out,
We looked good in the candlelight glow.
Steve Shoemaker welcoming President Bill Clinton
I’ve been bald quite a while to the North,
But luxuriant beard’s round my mouth.
The Chemo’s relentless,
And soon I’ll be beardless,
And I never again will glance South…
Scroll all the way down to the link View the Original Post to read and hear Ruth Pitter’s poem The Bird in the Tree.
https://lanciaesmith.com/image-for-the-day-advent/
For January 2nd in my Anthology from Canterbury Press, Waiting on the Word, I have chosen to read The Bird in the Tree by Ruth Pitter. On New Year’s Eve we considered Hardy’s almost reluctant glimpse of transfiguration ‘when Frost was spectre-grey, and ‘shrunken hard and dry’, and Hardy’s heart, bleak as the world through which he moves, nevertheless hears for a moment the ‘ecstatic sound’ of his darkling thrush. And even though he wanted to end his poem with the word ‘unaware’, something of the transcended has ‘trembled through’ his poem. Today’s poem, also about hearing a bird in a tree, also addresses the question of how the transcendent might for ‘a moment of time’ ‘tremble through’ into the immanent.
You can hear me read this poem by clicking on the title or the play button. the image above was created by Lancia Smith, and carries a quotation…
View original post 167 more words
I hear the purr from spouse
As I feel the urge to pee
The quilt I push aside
And pivot socks to floor
The Persian carpet edge
I feel and know is worn
As I pad unsteadily
Around the bed
My right hand holds
The maple top
Of bureau that long ago
Lost the marble slabs
I wobble but reach out
For the chrome handle
Of the closet door
And inch to reach
The bathroom door
Always open to the bars
That help the elderly
Stay upright until
The seat is reached
No more do I stand
To urinate but
Lower pull-ups
Ahh release
Pull old body up again
Repeat my steps
Return to bed
INTRO: Steve just posted on his CaringBridge site: “Awoke clear-headed, with more energy than in weeks. Just wrote this poem”:
I do not know how to die.
No words left to say good-bye.The cancer spread everywhere;
Family and friends showed they care.Will I find a peaceful death?
Or fight for each gasping breath?Be here now? To future bow…
- Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL, Dec. 29, 2015
NOTE:
Biggest and smallest Dogs
My friend and Views from the Edge colleague, Steve, was diagnosed mid-November with terminal pancreatic cancer. For years death and dying have been a topic of conversation among the seminary friends who keep changing our group’s name. At first we called ourselves The Chicago Seven. After Dale died, we were six. We became The Gathering. More lately we call ourselves The Dogs. Steve at 6’8 is the biggest Dog. He’s always said “Big dogs go first.”
A month ago Steve came to Minnesota for a consultation at the Mayo Clinic. On a Thursday, Kay and I visited Steve and Nadja in their small room at the Kaylor Hotel across the street from the Clinic. While Nadja and Kay began to discuss the procedures Steve would undergo the next day, Steve stuck his fingers in his ears and smiled at me. I’m with Steve, I’d rather just do it when it’s time. I’d rather not know. I wonder if it’s a guy thing.
Steve wrote “The Last Septet” after his second Chemo treatment back in Illinois, a treatment meant to give him more time with no illusions about the outcome. To live forthrightly without illusion is a beautiful thing. Meanwhile, the other five Dogs watch and pray, growl and snarl, curse the cancer, mourn his demise, remember our shared mortality and the line from the Presbyterian Church (USA) A Brief Statement of Faith: “In life and death we belong to God.”
Gordon, a much smaller Dog, December 29, 2015.
INTRO: This piece uses the Hebrew terms for man (atham) and woman (athama), descriptions that remind Hebrew readers that human beings are of the dust, of the earth.
The Exchange
“Did God really say you will die if you
eat the fruit of the tree in the middle
of the garden, the tree of the knowledge
of good and evil?” asked the snake
of the woman beside the Elysian tree.So she did eat and so did he – Atham
and Athama, the earthlings – wishing to
be like God, mocking death by dividing
evil from the good down below where
a snake exchanged a hiss for a kiss.“Cursed are you among all animals,”
said God. “On your belly you shall go,
eating dust along your way. Atham
and Athama will bruise your head,
and you shall bruise their heel.”Then the two-legged creatures knowing
good and evil, dividing the Garden between
sheep and goats, stumbled at a nip on
the heel and heard a hiss: “You, too,
are dust, and to dust you shall return.”Of the forbidden fruit of that one tree all
earthlings still do eat despite the voice
from the tree that tamed the snake,
exchanging a kiss for the hiss: “Forgive
them, for they know not what they do.”
- Gordon C. Stewart, Chaska, MN, Dec. 28, 2015
Views from the Edge 