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This zero hour, drawn up in arms, began
Before today’s alarms. It was perhaps
When for the pines, you primed a caravan.
They sang of Beulah land; they fought collapse.
That was my church, was baptized there. It burned,
Returning to the limitless. Thus time
Its levy makes. But music stayed, and spurned
Night: “we’ll understand it all, by and by.”
Aunt Mildred had prepared pot roast. The sweet,
Sweet tea, in plastic pitchers went around.
The eighth day dawned, it dawns, and with it fleets
All days since chaos was by Spirit drowned.
The throne awaits, the river and the trees,
For us to fall, to rise, and be received.
[A few notes as an aid in reading. I live in the Boston area, but grew up in Arkansas. A series of personal calamities has caused me to turn finally to writing poetry. Though I have lived a long time in Boston, and most of my friends are here, when you lose everything, you start to think of home, where you grew up. In my hours of loneliness, I thought of my church community and all the family members who would gather together at the matriarch's house after church on Sundays, a weekly family reunion. Such communal life is essential to the sacredness of Sunday, the eschatological day in the middle of time, the day of the completion of Creation in Christ's Resurrection, which brings on the coming of the New Jerusalem (“the throne, the river, and the trees” refers to Revelation 22:1-2). That City is the ultimate community, which will gather the whole family of humanity into the embrace of the Trinity, the divine community. This completes the plan sweeping through all times from the beginning, when the Spirit of God moved over the face of the waters of chaos (Genesis 1:2), culminating in the baptism of Jesus in the Jordan (Matthew 3:13-17), during which for the justification of each one of us Jesus is buried in the waters of chaos under the wings of the dove. Alpha and Omega are simply eternal love.
Pine Grove Baptist Church was our church growing up, a small building in the pines. It burned down a few years ago. The hymn singing in the South provides such spiritual nourishment, with the congregation drawn together into the aching harmony. The quote is from "Farther Along."
This personal archaeology made me confront the passing of all things, which led me back to the Anaximander fragment, the oldest surviving lines of Western philosophy.
One underlying theme of the whole thing: no times are lost in the eschatological Day, every single day, every kairos, every trial of character, every going-under, sails from and towards the New Jerusalem.]
Before today’s alarms. It was perhaps
When for the pines, you primed a caravan.
They sang of Beulah land; they fought collapse.
That was my church, was baptized there. It burned,
Returning to the limitless. Thus time
Its levy makes. But music stayed, and spurned
Night: “we’ll understand it all, by and by.”
Aunt Mildred had prepared pot roast. The sweet,
Sweet tea, in plastic pitchers went around.
The eighth day dawned, it dawns, and with it fleets
All days since chaos was by Spirit drowned.
The throne awaits, the river and the trees,
For us to fall, to rise, and be received.
[A few notes as an aid in reading. I live in the Boston area, but grew up in Arkansas. A series of personal calamities has caused me to turn finally to writing poetry. Though I have lived a long time in Boston, and most of my friends are here, when you lose everything, you start to think of home, where you grew up. In my hours of loneliness, I thought of my church community and all the family members who would gather together at the matriarch's house after church on Sundays, a weekly family reunion. Such communal life is essential to the sacredness of Sunday, the eschatological day in the middle of time, the day of the completion of Creation in Christ's Resurrection, which brings on the coming of the New Jerusalem (“the throne, the river, and the trees” refers to Revelation 22:1-2). That City is the ultimate community, which will gather the whole family of humanity into the embrace of the Trinity, the divine community. This completes the plan sweeping through all times from the beginning, when the Spirit of God moved over the face of the waters of chaos (Genesis 1:2), culminating in the baptism of Jesus in the Jordan (Matthew 3:13-17), during which for the justification of each one of us Jesus is buried in the waters of chaos under the wings of the dove. Alpha and Omega are simply eternal love.
Pine Grove Baptist Church was our church growing up, a small building in the pines. It burned down a few years ago. The hymn singing in the South provides such spiritual nourishment, with the congregation drawn together into the aching harmony. The quote is from "Farther Along."
This personal archaeology made me confront the passing of all things, which led me back to the Anaximander fragment, the oldest surviving lines of Western philosophy.
One underlying theme of the whole thing: no times are lost in the eschatological Day, every single day, every kairos, every trial of character, every going-under, sails from and towards the New Jerusalem.]
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