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Brother Louis Versus Tom Turkey
Ho! There Tom Turkey, lurky, perky, smirky Hiding in the thicket, hedged in by your picket. Still I spy your secret. I hide behind a tree. I will creep a little closer, and still you cannot see Noser, Imposer; fetch closer I’ll be. Smelled you in the delly, welly telly smelly Steppin’ and a snap it, trodden foot a-crack it. You can spy all you want Louis, you old smeller, Because I’m sly like a wight, a private sort of feller A bright, aright, a sprite forest dweller. So say you clucky, lucky ducky, clucky Barking like a hound with a fox you’d found. I heard you from afar Tom, rasping to the ladies. Thought I’d keep you on your toes, you and your mateys. Suppose I arose to keep your souls from Hades. If I aholt ya, note ya, groped ya, poked ya So to pin your claws back, held your beak that gnaws at, That’d teach you a fine lesson In the art of stealthy. I’d do you no great damage, but turn you wiser, wealthy. For man is to manage his Man-Age Self be. Louis, let me free be, me be, flee me, freely I don’t trust one iota, tricksy since I known ya. You’d ring my neck And pluck my plume My tasty meat for you to eat, and bring me to my doom – Eat complete to feet! Nothing left to entomb! You are part right: “pretend friend.” Amend the end, For we’ve been know to eat you at times when we’d greet you. But not this time. Us two are One. “And how’s that so? A trick trap you’ve spun. All show you know, I know your web I’ll pull undone.” This conflict’s but a shadow, sad-o, bad-o, mad-o A lie devised, The Grand Disguise, a split there lies. We left each other Just like two brothers, One prodigal and wild, the other breathless, smothers One wild err-child, beguiled thus true and false to the other’s. This talk is through. Adieu to you, Dear Lou! I still call the shots, like it or nots. The upper-hand is mine. Freedom is no sin. You’d plow my back – it’d never end. Crack! Attack back – that’s how I defend. Shadow Tom don’t run. Be done with fun young one. You know I can’t defeat you, so it’s impossible to eat you. All right keep your space. But I’ve come afar to teach you. “I don’t want to hear it! You boring old preach, you! Can’t bear it, dare it, swear it! Spare it I beseech you!” Tom, you chew Old Lou black and blue through and through. But you’re not the boss; I skim you like dross. You float on by, This pilgrim’s rest a-tarryin’. Stand still as a tree to quiet Tom’s delirium. Flee and cleave to Thee: unum est necessarium.* Tom! Where’d ya go? Flee go? See go? Ego! Vanished like a vapor, it’s the same ol’ caper. Gave me the slip, Left me in the lurch. We always end this way, both putting on the smurch. He say, ‘give way some day,’ diabolic saint in a forest church. * “The one necessary thing” By Brother Dancha, December 2010
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by Rev. Dr. Daniel C. Wilburn
Sowing Tears Silence! Be Silent! The silent rustling of the cold winter stalks Left trussed upon the frozen clods. Whispering their memories of bygone summer days Rain, dark storms, morning dew, heat Blue and green, brown and black “Yellow Face to gladden my veins!” say they. all for nothing Where is the joy of the harvest? Who comes with sheaves abounding And a song on their lips? The corn stalks stand as totems to an Earlier promised prosperity But we stole it, sold it, abused those Precious gifts: land and soil, The fertile rows of humanity – children, men and women. And I, O Lord, yes I, myself ignore them like a Lazarus And threw them away in the inner city, Speaking to myself: ‘why won’t the government do something?’ Warm bed, plenty of food, shelter and laughter. But those still white stalks stand rustling their memories, a lament, “What has become of our basket of fruit?” by Brother Dancha 2010 (Amos 8) by Rev. Dr. Daniel C. Wilburn
One of my three or four favorite holy days of the year: This is St. Nicholas’ Day. Nicholas is the patron saint of pawnbrokers because Nicholas is the patron saint of the poor. How strange that pawnbrokers, who “service” the poor by making leveraged loans usually for desperate situations. This is how we take advantage of the poor. Here’s another one: Ol’ St. Nick is the patron saint of sailors – uh, er, rather pirates! “Sailors” stole his remains from the Holy Lands about one thousand years ago and carried them off to Italy. I’ve always thought the shopping mall Santa should have been a pirate… you know, complete with scraggly beard, dirty horizontal black and white striped shirt, peg-leg, eyepatch, parrot, saber – “ArrR! Little girl, comes to Santy and make known ye wishes if ye may, er I’ll run me blade clean through yer scurvy hide, I will! Har Har Har!” That’s more accurate, yes, I think so. That’d make the kids think twice about naughty and nice. The real Bishop Nicholas one night secretly slipped three bags of gold in to three destitute girl’s stockings as they hung out to dry. These were probably young women, no dowry, so they could not be married, and so they were destined for prostitution in the 4th century – bound for the sex trade. Nicholas rescued them. (BTW The symbol for pawnbrokers is three gold bags.) Nicholas followed Jesus and became nothing, became less – gave up his treasure for a more valuable treasure. Today’s newspaper tells of yet another near tallest building going up in the world: The Shanghai Tower. China now has four of the world’s ten tallest buildings under construction. When the world wants to “show their arm of might” they build tall buildings and towers of Babel (they do this if they can’t find a polite war to wage some place far away). “Let’s make a name for ourselves,” the men of the world said to one another. Meanwhile Nicholas quietly serves and saves, and slips into emptiness – like Jesus. This is a clear case of “towers versus mangers.” Ironic to me that Nicholas has become the patron saint of holiday commerce: Black Fridays and Cyber Mondays, bottom-lines and profits – another financial tower of the affluent. Now I can go buy that wine glass aerator I really NEED. Nicholas measured success by giving, not building empires. This night 800,000 Chinese peasants will go to sleep, a silent night, a poor night… waiting for you and me and the rest of the world to be Nicholas to them. |
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