Category Archives: Uncategorized

Twenty-three

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Uncertain, listening for cues, she gives

One-word responses…can’t tell jokes. But then

after gin and nonsense, alone, she talks

for hours of the boys, teenagers, men

she has had sex with–more than she can count

or remember. She doesn’t know just why

she slept with them except they seemed to want

to. But the abortions…each one is clear

in her mind…each dead perhaps child. Now more

than anything she wants a live baby.

Her job is okay, frustrating, but half

challenging. There and everywhere she hides

her beauty, camouflages hair, breasts, eyes,

to slip unseen…maybe make a new life.

– Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL, September 21, 2013, soon to appear as the speaker at Tuesday Dialogues October 1, 2013 at Shepherd of the Hill Presbyterian Church in Chaska, MN.

Tower of Strength

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Why Atlas, Samson, Hercules, Paul Bunyan
and Superman aren’t with us anymore…
and why the latest SuperHero won’t last.

He was strong. Unlike some men his size
power pulsed, constrained–there was no fat.
He stood tall. His eyes looked down on those
passing by who turned and stared, impressed.
He would smile. He joked when asked his height,
Five feet…twenty!” Childhood awe returned
(big is best, is boss.) Authority
is imposed. The strong do what they want.

He had never been a little child–
young, but never small. Assumed adult,
he was proud to grapple, fight and hold,
lift and shoulder, carry, guard, protect.
Work was good, but work was never done.
Satisfaction was postponed. Trials like
cancer cells dividing, unrestrained,
overwhelmed him. Tasks enough to make
gods despair. Then buildings built decayed,
bridges fell, and wars blazed in the land
he had calmed before. He went to bed.
The world’s weight will break the strongest man.

-Steve Shoemaker
[Published in Response, Journal of the Lutheran
Society for Worship, Music and the Arts, No. 3,
1976.]

EDITOR’S NOTE: Apologies to Steve for the formatting. The first three lines were originally centered. The blog hasn’t cooperated this morning. Art fell victim to technology. BUT without te3chnology “Tower of Strength” would not have come your way.

Join Steve at Shepherd of the Hill Presbyterian Church in Chaska, MN Tuesday, October 1 at 7:00 p.m. for a Tuesday Dialogues program featuring Steve’s poetry.

Atlas and St. Patrick Cathedral

Atlas and St. Patrick Cathedral

Poetic night view from the plains

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Twilight on the Plains

Three things up above tonight,
No, four: last, a star, (the kite
First reached altitude), a hot
Air balloon was second, third,
Bright against the dark-turned
Sky–precisely half a moon.

Matches lit the hurricane
Lantern and a pipe beside
Rocking chair, plants, on side
Porch. Horizon towns show light
After light: gold, yellow, white.
Flashing red antennas point…

– Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL, September 21, 2003.

Join Steve for an evening of poetry on the theme “Becoming Free: Go Fly a Kite” Tuesday, October 1 at 7:00 p.m. Steve’s visit is part of the Shepherd of the Hill Presbyterian Church’s Tuesday Dialogues Program: examining critical public issues locally and globally. Steve will look at emancipation – both social and personal – in advance of a major celebration of the 150th Anniversary of the Emancipation Declaration here in Chaska, MN on Saturday, October 26 at Chaska High School.

The Donkey’s Questions

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Matthew’s Gospel has two asses (donkeys), not one, in its Palm Sunday narrative. “They brought the ass and the colt, and put their garments on them, and he sat thereon.” Steve Shoemaker’s versed ponders the scene from the standpoint of the colt.

Verse – The Donkey’s Questions on Palm Sunday,
according to St. Matthew

He searched for just the right stick…
but then he never hit me? Why
go to all that trouble? Pick
the answer: 1. that he would try
directing the singing? 2.
to lean on when the day was through?

Why does he ride on my mom
while I’m just trotting alongside?
What does “Halleluja” mean?
Who’ll pick up clothes after the ride?
Now he shifts and rides on me–
he breaks the stick and makes a “T.”
His face looks like he’s had a loss…
Is he thinking of that cross?

– Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL,

17 Pounds

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If matter never disappears but only changes form, where now are the 17 pounds that disappeared from my waistline over the last two months?

Shrinking waistline

Shrinking waistline

Okay, the picture is of some other guy 🙂

On the Road to Damascus

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This sermon connects the interruption of Paul’s journey to Syria with the recent U.S. threat to bomb Syria to destroy evil in the name of goodness.

Verse – learning when age-ed

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the teachers now are all younger
they have read more than i ever
will their devices seem part of
their hands but words and books they love
still as well as screens and apple
will my swiss cheese mind prove ample

-Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL, September 19, 2013

Swiss Chees Brain

Swiss Chees Brain

Steve is bringing his Swiss cheese mind to Tuesday Dialogues at Shepherd of the Hill Presbyterian Church in Chaska, MN on Tuesday, October 1.

Verse – A Stain on the Moon (Brain?)

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While driving home last night, I saw

a full moon in the eastern sky.

There were no clouds wandering by

(I’m sorry, Wordsworth…), but I saw

a line, a dark smudge–vertical–

move from the upper right and fall

quite slowly (like a tentacle)

down to the lower left. 

                                               I called

my spouse at home using my cell

(risking the lives of all around),

but she saw nothing.  Could it be

a floater in my eye?  Windshield

bugs, butterflies?  Or could it be,

as some have thought, that I’m crazy.

 

-Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL, September 19, 2013

Howling at the Moon

Howling at the Moon

Howl at the moon with Steve Tuesday, October 1 at 7:00 p.m. at Shepherd of the Hill Church Tuesday Dialogues: examining critical public issues locally and globally: “Emancipation: Becoming Free – Go Fly a Kite!”

Sojourner Truth – Ain’t I a Woman?

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Anticipating Shepherd of the Hill Dialogues’ “Voices of the Slaves” program celebrating the 150th Anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation, we offer Sojourner Truth’s speech here on Views from the Edge. The Tuesday Dialogue on Oct. 15 (7:00 P.M.) will feature dramatic readings like this one and the music that originated in the cotton fields.

Sojourner Truth

Sojourner Truth

Human Evolution

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This NPR piece Attenborough’s muddled thinking can’t stop human evolution came to our attention this morning by way of David Earle from New Zealand.

David’s blog is In the Company of Hysterical Women.

His comment on yesterday’s Views from the Edge post The American Religion reads, in part:

Fortunately Sir David is totally wrong on all counts. It is only a small fraction of humanity that benefit for these improvements and even then, it has little to no measurable impact apparently on generic change across population. …

But he is tapping into a wider sentiment that some day we might be so in control of our own destiny that we are no longer subject to this nasty, animal based thing called evolution.

Isn’t that when we force our way back to the garden and eat from the second tree?

Editor’s note: David is referring to the Genesis story (Gen. 2 and 3) where what David calls “the “first tree” is the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (the tree of control/mastery by which they will “be like God”). “The second tree” is the tree of life (by which the characters in the story would become eternal.)

The Garden story is not history; it’s anthropology and theology. It never happened; it’s always happening.

Your thoughts on the matter are welcome. Leave a comment to promote the discussion.