Category Archives: verse

White Privilege in Verse

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Trumpeter Swans, Hudson, WI

Down is Up and up is down

The trumpeter swans
Know nothing of
White privilege
White is what they are
Down under and
Above the down
Except for beaks
As black as ebony
on ivory

Their voice is not
the honk of pride
and privilege
Pens and cobs
Teach their young
The Beatitudes
Where Up is really
Down and Down is
Up without a down-
Ward sneer at
Loons or Redwing
Blackbirds

Ebony and ivory
Nesting in a wetland
Marsh where no
Manicured lawns 
And Scotts-fed 
Greens feed faux-
White privilege.
- GCS, May, 2021

Now when Jesus saw the crowds, he went up on a mountainside and sat down. His disciples came to  him, and he began to teach them.

He said:

“Blessed are the poor in spirit,
    for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
 Blessed are those who mourn,
    for they will be comforted.
 Blessed are the meek,
    for they will inherit the earth.
 Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness,
    for they will be filled. 
 Blessed are the merciful,
    for they will be shown mercy.
 Blessed are the pure in heart,
    for they will see God.
 Blessed are the peacemakers,
    for they will be called children of God.
 Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness,
    for theirs is the kingdom of heaven."

-- Gospel According to Matthew 5:1-10 NIV
Distraught Christ
Photograph of two Trumpeter Swans.
MAGA Jesus on January 6
MPD murder of George Floys
Rush Limbaugh receiving Presidential Medal of Freedom, 2020.
Rush Limbaugh receiving Presidential Medal of Freedom honoring people who have made “an especially meritorious contribution to the security or national interests of the United States, world peace, cultural or other significant public or private endeavors” — State of the Union, 2020.

Gordon C. Stewart, public theologian, author of Be Still! Departure from Collective Madness (2017 Wipf and Stock), Brooklyn Park, Minnesota, March 3, 2022.

Light and Bright and White Again

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Reality is a Hologram?

REALITY

The book of flesh and
Blood hangs by a
Slender thread we cut
To shred the pages
We wish were not —
The days and nights of
sadness, fear and dread
Where death is real

Reality is now a holo-
Gram for us who live
In cyberspace and Sci-
Fi worlds that wipe
The Black board clean
And White again
As it was before the
Black birds came

The hollow holograms
Float on air they never
Breathe while we and
All that is or ever was
In flesh and blood shine
Light and bright and
White again but miss
Clouds and rainbows

GCS
 2.2.2022
Rainbow over the IL prairie.

Between Substance and Illusion

“The line between substance and illusion is as thin as the line between reality and appearance. The history of humankind is a tale of an idiot, humankind’s conscious preference for the ‘sweet illusions’ that glimmer from tinsel, broken glass, and oily rags for the colors of a rainbow.
“It seems to be the contention of the Trump campaign that nothing is really true,” wrote Jack Holmes in the September 26, 2016 issue of Esquire; “it only matters what enough people believe, and whether you can dangle enough shiny objects in front of them until the clock runs out on November 8.” -- Jack Holmes, Esquire, September 26, 2016

Gordon C. Stewart, Brooklyn Park, MN, Feb. 1, 2022

Morning Walk by the Shrinking Wetland Pond

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sumacs in autumn
THE WETLAND POND

The wetland pond is shrinking.
Dark-chocolate cattails and 
summer-green milkweed pods 
burst into the white cotton 
balls they always do when
autumn comes, a cotton 
field of wisps and puffs that 
match the color of my hair.

The sumacs are changing into
the red dress they always wear
this time of year, a royal
crimson robe, glistening in 
the morning sun before
frost and snow turn their 
fleeting autumn puffs from 
regal red to winter white. 
 
I see no yellow on the wetland
pond beside this dirt road that 
has no name or dot on anyone’s 
map. The yellow lilies on the 
lily-pads have gone to sleep
to greet the Spring again if
the pond is still here. 

--GCS, September morning walk
September 27, 2021.
O LORD, what are we that You should care for us?
     mere mortals that You should think of us?
We are like a puff of wind;
     our days are like a passing shadow.
Do not cast me off in my old age.
     (Psalm 144:3,4; 71:9 BCP)

.

i used to run through fields

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photo of grandson Elijah with the spoon he's just begun to use.
Grandson Elijah enjoying his new soon.

“Bubbles” – at 4:00 A.M.

 i used to run through fields
 laughing, blowing bubbles
 floating up, up, away
 off to Who-knows-where
 …
 now I watch the bubbles
 burst, burst, burst –
 dreams, illusions, hopes,
 bursting into air
 …
 time and death bursting
 all our bubbles
 for we are puffs of air
 but for a time
 …
 till some child runs
 again through fields
 of green, blowing bubbles
 that float … up and up
 …
 swelling, rising, not yet bursting
 each bubble its own
 never to be repeated self
 precious beyond belief
 …
 while we in our old age
 move toward the end of time
 evaporating into eternity
 Whence we came.

 "Bubbles"

 – Gordon C. Stewart (@)

Gordon C. Stewart, Chaska, MN, Dec. 4, 2019

I’m having a hard time . . .

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“I’m having a hard time ...”
 he said with a scowl
 coming through the line
 to shake the hand 
 of the preacher who had
 preached his first sermon
 at the church judged
 to be the leading voice in
 the civil rights and peace
 movements in the city.
 
 “I’m having a hard time
 not hitting you,” he said,
 holding back his right arm
 with his left hand as the
 new 26 year-old anti-war 
 pastor reached to shake 
 his hand.  

 “Pools of Blood” had packed 
 a punch with the chair of the
 City Human Rights Commission.

GCS, July 20, 2019

Written in response to today’s Weekend Writing Prompt challenge to write a poem or prose on the word “judge” with exactly 95 words.

We sat down over coffee later that week.

White Privilege

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Trumpeter Swans
know nothing of
white privilege

White is what they are
down under and above
the down

Except for beaks
as black as ebony
on ivory

Their trumpet calls
are not the honks
of honky privilege

Proud cobs and pens
teach their cygnets
that down is up

With no guile or sneer
at loons and redwing
blackbirds

Ebony and ivory
nesting on the marsh
they share

Beyond the gates
where honkies honk
of privilege

  • Gordon C. Stewart on the wetland with the Trumpeter Swans, loons, and redwing blackbirds, June 21, 2018

The Fireflies

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No unnatural light disturbs the night here by the wetland. The night in this sacred wilderness is pitch dark. But last night the lights were everywhere. Click HERE for photos of fireflies, aka, lightning bugs.

THE DANCE OF FIREFLIES

Children frolic to catch you
in midair as you light up
backyards before bedtime
to watch you blink and glitter
in our peanut butter jars
until your little lights go out.

Grown-up children wake at night
in need of different jars and
by fate or chance catch
through the window a glimpse
of your midnight dance and glitter
on the wetland beyond all jars.

And children on canes and walkers
watch and wonder why we
with such little jars once sought
to capture you and make ours
the dance of fireflies that glitter
before and after our lights go out.

  • Gordon C. Stewart at The Pea Pod with the sandhill cranes, trumpeter swans, herons, loons, redwing blackbirds — and fireflies. June 11, 2018.

 

Truth Be Told

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Steve Shoemaker

Steve Shoemaker

Steve Shoemaker rushed into mind today. I searched for what Steve had to say on Palm Sunday here on Views from the Edge. Little could Steve have known in 2012 that Palm Sunday in 2018 would be topped off by a “60 Minutes” interview with a porn star refuting claims of “fake news” coming from the man in the Oval Office.

The Donkey: a Kid’s Verse

The coats the folks are throwing down

sure make it hard for me to walk

especially carrying this clown

whose feet are almost to the ground.

“Hosannah King!” is all the talk,

but this guy seems to be as poor

as I am–no one could mistake

him for a Royal–he’s just a fake!

They wave palm branches, and they roar,

but my long ears can hear the real

parade across the city square:

the General, the Priests, the score

of war horses–the whole grand deal.

This pitiful parade will fail

to save a soul, and soon the yell

will change from “Hail!” to…”Kill!”

[Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL, March 28, 2012]

Jesus and Barabbas

Release of Barabbas – artwork by Wenceslas Coehergher

The donkey that carried “the clown” stands in deliberate contrast to Caesar’s war horses. All these years later, Jesus of the donkey and the donkey continue to speak truth to power. Today I lay my coat on the road for the humble king of kings.

Thank you, Steve. RIP.

  • Gordon C. Stewart, Chaska, MN, Palm Sunday/Passion Sunday, March 25, 2018.

 

 

Christ the King

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Poet Malcolm Guite’s poetry holds the essential paradox of the Christian faith and life. Open the re-blogged piece to read and listen to his poem for the last Sunday of the Christian liturgical year, Christ the King Sunday.

Malcolm Guite

20111119-111210We come now to a feast of Ends and Beginnings! This Sunday is the last Sunday in the cycle of the Christian year, which ends with the feast of Christ the King, and next Sunday we begin our journey through time to eternity once more, with the first Sunday of Advent. We might expect the Feast of Christ the King to end the year with climactic images of Christ enthroned in Glory, seated high above all rule and authority, one before whom every knee shall bow, and of course those are powerful and important images, images of our humanity brought by him to the throne of the Heavens. But alongside such images we must also set the passage in Matthew (25:31-46) in which Christ reveals that even as He is enthroned in Glory, the King who comes to judge at the end of the ages, he is also the hidden King…

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The Fly that Would not Flee

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In the pre-dawn pastel glow

Outside the lakeside window,

The fly inside is very still.

pre-sunrise glow

Lake Superior pre-dawn pastel glow.

 

For the half hour before the sun

Pokes its yellow head over

The brim of Superior’s horizon,

The fly does not move.

 

Perhaps the fly is dead, I think,

And gently touch it from below.

It does not fly away.

200px-Simulium_trifasciatum_adult_(British_Entomology_by_John_Curtis-_765)

It takes a few steps forward,

An inch or two higher on the window —

This oratory the intruder has disturbed

In the hour of morning prayer.

 

Only after the sun has risen

Does it leave the window

But not before completing

 

Its sun-dance: turning from east

To south, to west, to north, and

Back to East again to greet the day.

 

The observing intruder from whose

Finger the fly did not flee reads

from The Book of Common Prayer:

 

“Deliver me, O Lord, from evil-doers;

Protect me from the violent,

Who desire evil in their hearts

And stir up strife all day long.”

[Psalm 140:1-2]

 

A fly lands on the prayer book.

I swat the fly away.

  • Gordon C. Stewart, the intruder, Encampment Forest, Lake Superior, MN, October 6, 2017