VINCULUM ANNORUM
CHAIN OF YEARS
REUNION
MAY 2014
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DEDICATED
TO
THE CLASSES OF 1961 AND 1965
AND
MY HEROES, MY MOTHER & FATHER
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FORWARD
These pieces are the result of a series of recent communications with a group of people representing the school experiences of my youth.
The sentiments and the topics all seemed to flow from that encounter, as well as, the fact that it was Easter and Spring, and new life was finally taking hold.
Life! Life that is nothing more than who I am in the silence; moments that are the result of the paring of everything that I have acquired; the laying bare of who I was before the patina prospered.
Our early years represent that silence, that paring, that naked self.
We will never be anyone, unless we return there in heart and spirit, if not in the body. However, the attempt to return to the innocence of that period could inspire the flesh to find a wholesomeness it has forgotten and one which it needs to prepare itself for its own final journey.
One of the poems alludes to this fact; ‘Last Chance’ talks of the dream that will not die. When we see and experience so much dying within ourselves and those around us, it is easy to lose our vision, perspective, orientation and innocence.
Here is to the hope that we all find a dream that does not diminish or die, but lives on eternally.
FONDLY,
Your classmate
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CONTENTS
- ONLY NOTHING
- GOD IS NOW
- QUIET ACCOUNTING
- ETERNAL MOVEMENT
- PERSONAL TRUTH
- CHURCH
- MESSY WISDOM
- RAW SPIRIT
- FONDNESS
- COUNTING INDIANS
- MY CHRIST
- LAST CHANCE
- PRAY WITH ME
- NAG, WAG, RAG
- REUNION WITHIN
- HOME AGAIN
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ONLY NOTHING
Nothing can keep me focused
On this moment,
Except the solitary experience
Of a God
That is eternally Alone,
Holy and One;
A community of
Spirit, Father and Son;
A life given, lost
Sacrificed and won again;
Done for many
Who find the same journey;
Alive together
Only in truth.
2014.04.27.0000
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GOD IS NOW
Everything is essentially a memory;
This moment,
Today,
Now
Is already gone,
In an heart beat;
The blink of an eye
Finds another picture framed
As yesterday;
A way I may stay
The play that does not stop
Except, I remember
Where I may be tomorrow and
Who I am is now.
2014.05.01.0600
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QUIET ACCOUNTING
Losing it or lost it,
The difference is becoming
Moot;
To today I am becoming
Less enamored, while
To yesterday I am attuned
And more astute;
My gains are counted obtuse
Experiences, my losses
Strikingly acute;
The columns are colored
In shades of red;
The bottom line
Does not compute.
So I keep the books closed now,
As well as my eyes
And keep my tongue tied and mute.
2014.05.01.0800
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ETERNAL MOVEMENT
One day
The ties to yesterday
Must be cut,
So the current
To tomorrow
Can flow;
The soil of an earthly garden
Embraced,
So the flower of eternity
Might grow;
A light drawing me closer
To the source of all wisdom
And away from
The good I would know;
Until then,
I must be satisfied
Being too human in time
And moving
Around and around
And to and fro.
2014.05.02.1100
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PERSONAL TRUTH
The spark and the sparkle
Of living or
The flame of the Spirit
And Truth;
The comfort
Of finding life relative or
The glory of the Absolute;
We all make these choices
Every moment each day and
The one or the other refute;
But, in the end
The will of the Father will be
And our passing moments
Shall be personal
Yet moot.
2014.05.03.1600
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CHURCH
No directions!
No solutions!
Only convolutions
Around the mess;
Thank God,
There are disciples
To give absolution,
When we confess
To how we failed and
To when we were tempted
To put our constitution
To the test.
2014.05.04.0700
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MESSY WISDOM
Some days
I like the confines
Of my body
And the senses;
Some days,
I want to fly
To angels’ rests;
I pray,
It is the Spirit of God
That leads me,
Giving me wisdom
To know the truth and
What is best.
Temptation
Is the calling card
Of error,
The game we play,
The fool’s recurrent test;
It keeps us
In a constant state
Of make-believe
That this life is something more
Than just a mess.
2014.05.04.0700
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RAW SPIRIT
It is the mess
Which is the test
To the creative Spirit;
Working
With the unrefined and
Raw and rough;
Using art
And science,
Wisdom
And gentle persuasion;
Turning what would seem
As hopeless
Into love.
2014.05.04.0800
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FONDNESS
I really do not want to be bothered;
But I play the game of love
And then beyond
I turn to greed and need
And expectation
To want to tie some knot
Or fuse a bond; so rather than
Some artificial sentiment
That must in the end
Eventually be gone,
Let’s just be friends and
Say we like each other and
Appreciate that the feeling
Is just fond.
2014.05.04.0800
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COUNTING INDIANS
I am sure that our years
Are counted by spring times;
The music and the song
After periods of silence;
The crescendo of the symphony
Of the senses;
The climax of the drama
Of the cycle of life.
The other seasons are
Folly, denouement and death.
That spring climax
Requires a rejoicing
In the glory of resurrection;
While the summer needs
A sober retreat
From our headlong
And headstrong immersion
In the senses;
The fall is a wake-up call
To sobriety
Regarding the impermanence
Of the exuberant life;
Winter?
Winter is the capitulation
To that evanescence.
2014.05.04.1900
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MY CHRIST
Sometimes my solitude knows
That there is a God
And can rejoice
In the solace and
In the celebration of
My participation
In His life;
That is my resurrection!
Sometimes my solitude cannot
Stand alone
In the dread
Of the knowledge of
The pain and the suffering
Of the impermanence
Of everything
And wants to assuage my fear
With personal pleasure or
Communal commiserations
That do no good
For the other, me or God.
That is my temptation!
Sometimes my solitude is blind
To the wonder of God
Or numb
To the implications of
My mortality;
Neither angel or saint,
Human or community;
It longs
To be free.
That is my cross!
2014.05.04.2000
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LAST CHANCE
Someone early tried
To awaken me to sin;
And another made sin seem
Child play and fun;
But I resisted the temptations
And became serious,
Until success seemed to say
The world had won;
But dreams are only meant for
Children, saints and poets; so
My childhood awakened,
My sanctity denied,
The poet would need surface
Because the dream
Had never died.
2014.05.04.2000
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PRAY WITH ME
Everyone is playing with me.
But I understand.
They cannot help it.
They do not know who they are
Any more than I do
On my best days.
So I do not have to be gay.
All that playing together
Is just foolish nonsense;
Inanity! Insanity! Profanity!
I must only find the Sacred
To give me courage
In the face of all the playing;
So I can run there,
Stay there and
Pray there.
2014.05.05.1800
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NAG, WAG, RAG
The persistent, nagging question
Is how can I celebrate
The wonder of the Father’s creation
And the love of the Redeeming Son
In the Spirit
When my spirit is beset by
The weakness of the flesh and
Sinful desires and inclinations
And is crushed by
My experience in the world
To which I repeatedly, but mistakenly,
Turn for love?
Even my attempts to rise above
My baser inclinations and to hold
Myself and others to a higher standard
Are met with rejection.
2014.05.06.1200
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REUNION WITHIN
Solitude always yields!
It runs from itself or from its fear
Or it runs to its earliest or latest
Memory of love.
This year is all wrapped up
In an experience I find as mine
This moment in time;
Alone or shared, it is no match
For the community that always
Resides within;
The reunion of who I have been.
2014.05.06.0300
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HOME AGAIN
My heroes have finally come home.
It took a lifetime of searching the unknown
But my heroes have finally come home.
They worked and they gave me the best that they had;
They taught me their understanding of the good and the bad;
My heroes turned out to be mother and dad;
My heroes have finally come home.
But why did it take me so long
To find out I had it all wrong?
There is no place I’d rather belong
Than with my heroes when I finally come home.
2014.05.09.0600
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CODA
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COPYRIGHT © ALL MAY 2014