REFLECTION ON A NATIVITY SCENE
Effigies in miniature they stand illuminating,
reminding of that grand memory, of that starry night.
And, standing, they beckon,
casting the imagination to that shepherd night of Bethlehem:
the stage, the lights, the manger;
etching those passages into the course of history:
a mother, a moonlit chamber, a child in swaddling clothes.
Forced into the still night of the stable, into the realm of flesh;
thrust from the radiance of eternity.
It is a memory of that culmination of eternal counsel
planted at birth into every human soul.
A memory running with us through the years
to emerge with each Christmas season
though it is never quite far away.
A memory that, having changed all that precedes it,
transforms, transfixes the meaning and foundation of existence.
A memory transforming all that it touches, leaving nothing inert;
changing the despair of pagan man.
Grand entrance of a fathomless revelation!
All else is a facade; all else is mere illusion and divergence:
music, colors (resplendent colors of harmony:
gold, green, red, crimson red, fluffy white,
stringy sparkling silver), movement(whirling and offsetting).
It is too earthy, too transient.
In the world of humanity, it creates only an illusion
of that palpable arena of peace, of love, of giving,
and of brotherly love that cannot be universal here.
It is an ember lighting the night, flying outward...and is gone...
It rushes as quickly as the last feet of reeled celluloid
from reality to ephemeral smoky memory.
But it is a glorious facade of white Christmas,
silver bells, sleigh rides, snow-swept moonlit
panoramas, misty breath in the air,
a mug of hot chocolate resting upon the hearth of a brick fireplace.
The blackboard of every heart contains that marching memory,
the estimation of value that Christ places on every man.
He provides the good and the beautiful.
He gives purpose.
“In swaddling clothes and lying in a manger.”
Folding the cardboard animals, removing the straw,
returning the borrowed doll cradle will not erase the season, the memory.
Those relics—props—will ever transcend time
and represent that starry announcement:
“A savior which is Christ the Lord!”
Idyllic Summer
Cades Cove in the Smokey Mtns
Wednesday, January 24, 2007
Mostly The Truth
My chest was constricted. I had to struggle to force the air in and out of my lungs in successive intervals. The old man sat, looming as big as evil itself, on the front porch of his house next door. It was old man Langley
Suddenly he and I were the only two people in a very small universe, and I knew he wanted to kill me. I furiously peddled my tricycle down the broken slabs of the sidewalk, pushing my legs harder than I thought possible. My lungs were bursting, and my heart pounded wildly. It was imperative that I escape from his sight; but, like in a dream when you try to move and can't, my legs were beginning to slow and were on the brink of totally refusing to cooperate.
Then the old man turned his grotesque head in my direction, evil emblazoned eyes beginning to burn my skin. The heat of the staring eyes was incredible, but I continued to jam my feet at the pedals. I thought I was going to reach the porch but a piece of broken concrete jumped up and turned my front wheel. Instantly, I was catapulted off the trike, head first into the coarse St. Augustine grass. Ignoring the razor jagged cuts of the serrated blades, and the bruises on my cheek and bare knees that took the brunt of the blow when I hit the ground, I quickly stood and flung myself beside the porch, beyond Langley's vision. His terrific gaze continued to search for me, but I remained stiff and silent in the shade of the porch to make sure he didn't physically move toward me. As I waited in the drenching wetness of my own sweat, I recalled the stern warning from my mother that morning as we came to visit the Tubertini's, "There's the man who killed your grandfather."
It was an old story, so infused in my thinking that I didn’t even remember the first time I heard it. It was part of my being, a salient part like an arm or leg. The family revealed it, remembered it, propagated its existence as though without it we would not be a family; that of a dark night in the thirties when an irate, irrational man, Langley, fired from the iron darkness indiscriminately toward my grandfather who was holding my uncle of three years old. He bled to death on a nearby porch begging his two oldest sons not to take Langley’s life, subsequently marring their own.
I never saw the grandfather because he left twelve years before I was born. But he was real and lived through the precious grandmother who loved her first grandson as much as she had loved the only husband she ever knew until her death, almost fifty years later, at eight-five. Often, since that horrendous day, when I first saw the sinister and withered form of Mr. Langley languishing on the small porch, I have studied the only picture made of my grandfather: a tall handsome man in a dark grey suit, leaning against a pine tree. In my mind, he was as different from his murderer as light is from dark. This contrast, I think, helped me to direct my later judgments about many things. As an adult, when I read, in the newspaper, of Mr. Langley’s needless and violet murder by thieves, I could feel a sense of sadness. I thought of his deceased grandson who, ironically, became my very best friend before we knew each other’s history.
Suddenly he and I were the only two people in a very small universe, and I knew he wanted to kill me. I furiously peddled my tricycle down the broken slabs of the sidewalk, pushing my legs harder than I thought possible. My lungs were bursting, and my heart pounded wildly. It was imperative that I escape from his sight; but, like in a dream when you try to move and can't, my legs were beginning to slow and were on the brink of totally refusing to cooperate.
Then the old man turned his grotesque head in my direction, evil emblazoned eyes beginning to burn my skin. The heat of the staring eyes was incredible, but I continued to jam my feet at the pedals. I thought I was going to reach the porch but a piece of broken concrete jumped up and turned my front wheel. Instantly, I was catapulted off the trike, head first into the coarse St. Augustine grass. Ignoring the razor jagged cuts of the serrated blades, and the bruises on my cheek and bare knees that took the brunt of the blow when I hit the ground, I quickly stood and flung myself beside the porch, beyond Langley's vision. His terrific gaze continued to search for me, but I remained stiff and silent in the shade of the porch to make sure he didn't physically move toward me. As I waited in the drenching wetness of my own sweat, I recalled the stern warning from my mother that morning as we came to visit the Tubertini's, "There's the man who killed your grandfather."
It was an old story, so infused in my thinking that I didn’t even remember the first time I heard it. It was part of my being, a salient part like an arm or leg. The family revealed it, remembered it, propagated its existence as though without it we would not be a family; that of a dark night in the thirties when an irate, irrational man, Langley, fired from the iron darkness indiscriminately toward my grandfather who was holding my uncle of three years old. He bled to death on a nearby porch begging his two oldest sons not to take Langley’s life, subsequently marring their own.
I never saw the grandfather because he left twelve years before I was born. But he was real and lived through the precious grandmother who loved her first grandson as much as she had loved the only husband she ever knew until her death, almost fifty years later, at eight-five. Often, since that horrendous day, when I first saw the sinister and withered form of Mr. Langley languishing on the small porch, I have studied the only picture made of my grandfather: a tall handsome man in a dark grey suit, leaning against a pine tree. In my mind, he was as different from his murderer as light is from dark. This contrast, I think, helped me to direct my later judgments about many things. As an adult, when I read, in the newspaper, of Mr. Langley’s needless and violet murder by thieves, I could feel a sense of sadness. I thought of his deceased grandson who, ironically, became my very best friend before we knew each other’s history.
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Guardians Of Time
May I say that we are guardian’s of time”
But how would we guard it?
Time slips away before our eyes,
From our experiences,
Through our never feeling fingers,
Relentlessly even when we are not intrepid.
Perhaps I should say that we are observers of time,
Each to his own age, his own slice of experience that
Can never be universal.
We have been given the seer-ship of a time,
As witnesses to verify the common existence
And to pass down the history to successive generations.
We must tell; they must listen—all have an obligation.
How would they know except we tell them?
Will they believe and account it for reality?
Will they conduct themselves accordingly?
One generation judges and considers redundant or superfluous
The catalogs of the passing generation.
Thanks, they say; now it is my day.
There is an authenticity for my time that cannot be affixed to yours.
It is my time, they say, that is pivotal;
My time changes the course of existence;
Yours never could, forgetting the foundation we saw.
In this sense, perhaps we are the guardians of time.
In our revealing; in our storing; in our subjective descriptions,
We hold our time against the misjudgment, the ignorance,
Of the self-serving generations that follow.
Sacrosanct, we hold it in delicate reserve from the prying eyes and ears
Of egocentrism.
We will remember, having seen, things that you never will
For they have not lived them, seen their minds and characters
Changed with the passing, unfolding day to day dispensing of experience.
And when it is time to fold our hands,
We can say that it was not the indiscriminate blur of pages
Jotted to fill an ethereal blackness that meant nothing.
The days were filled, as are yours, with color, action, voices, violence, peace, and meaningful activity.
Observe our head stones; note the dates.
Even if we say nothing, our existence and our passing marks in chiseled letters
The validity of an age.
We came, we saw, we passed to declare,
Our silent voices now speak of a time to share.
Will you listen and will you care?
If you are among the disbelieving, do you dare?
We have preserved an age, fulfilled our duty to observe’
Will you be an equally diligent?
We’ll let you know in the day you fold your hands and sigh.
But how would we guard it?
Time slips away before our eyes,
From our experiences,
Through our never feeling fingers,
Relentlessly even when we are not intrepid.
Perhaps I should say that we are observers of time,
Each to his own age, his own slice of experience that
Can never be universal.
We have been given the seer-ship of a time,
As witnesses to verify the common existence
And to pass down the history to successive generations.
We must tell; they must listen—all have an obligation.
How would they know except we tell them?
Will they believe and account it for reality?
Will they conduct themselves accordingly?
One generation judges and considers redundant or superfluous
The catalogs of the passing generation.
Thanks, they say; now it is my day.
There is an authenticity for my time that cannot be affixed to yours.
It is my time, they say, that is pivotal;
My time changes the course of existence;
Yours never could, forgetting the foundation we saw.
In this sense, perhaps we are the guardians of time.
In our revealing; in our storing; in our subjective descriptions,
We hold our time against the misjudgment, the ignorance,
Of the self-serving generations that follow.
Sacrosanct, we hold it in delicate reserve from the prying eyes and ears
Of egocentrism.
We will remember, having seen, things that you never will
For they have not lived them, seen their minds and characters
Changed with the passing, unfolding day to day dispensing of experience.
And when it is time to fold our hands,
We can say that it was not the indiscriminate blur of pages
Jotted to fill an ethereal blackness that meant nothing.
The days were filled, as are yours, with color, action, voices, violence, peace, and meaningful activity.
Observe our head stones; note the dates.
Even if we say nothing, our existence and our passing marks in chiseled letters
The validity of an age.
We came, we saw, we passed to declare,
Our silent voices now speak of a time to share.
Will you listen and will you care?
If you are among the disbelieving, do you dare?
We have preserved an age, fulfilled our duty to observe’
Will you be an equally diligent?
We’ll let you know in the day you fold your hands and sigh.
Satire on Ostentatious Etiquette
Satire On Ostentatious Etiquette
Inspired by a travel channel presentation on the proper way to have an afternoon tea, I relate the following instructions. “Grip the finger through the cup holder rather than gently clutching it with thumb and forefinger while the pinkie finger is delicately extended. Desserts: start at the top tier with the bread and scones, working your way systematically to the bottom and eating the chocolates last.”
The scene is intriguing: a concerned social worker is explaining the above process to a group of homeless men. They are crowded securely out of the piercing fingers of a brisk cold wind just inside the entrance alcove of an old retail store. Behind them, in front of the boarded door, a warming fire burns slowly within an upright, rusty barrel that shows the damage of many fires. The men look on with keen interest. There are four of them: Billy, tall, emaciated; Randy, short, lumbering with vacuous eyes; Marvin, an older man with heavy wrinkles; and Brad, average height but over weight, apparently well-fed despite his homeless state.
They are all routinely dressed cumbersomely to avoid the sharp winds of the downtown weather. Each has some type of hat on; two, in fact, Randy and Brad, wear the knitted style that fits the top of the head and covers the ears like a glove. Billy wears a thin baseball cap he has pulled down tightly to the tops of his ears, making him look like a little boy who doesn’t know how to put on a hat. Marvin has on a felt cowboy hat with the sides pulled down over his ears, like the wool flaps of an old World War II flight cap.
They seem interested by the presenter’s comments, grunting occasionally to encourage him. Somehow all this seems to make sense even though a delicate, expensive china cup is being used to demonstrate usage, and the presenter is dressed impeccably in neat attire. When the dessert segment is broached, one man comments about his ignorance in using donuts improperly. The social worker is ecstatic. He smiles broadly, an infectious smile that pervades the stinging air and forces the listeners, in turn, to risk breaking the icy plaster of their faces with a similar smile. Teaching has been successful and learning has been effected. The world has a future and life can continue as it was, unabated, unchanged through the centuries.
Inspired by a travel channel presentation on the proper way to have an afternoon tea, I relate the following instructions. “Grip the finger through the cup holder rather than gently clutching it with thumb and forefinger while the pinkie finger is delicately extended. Desserts: start at the top tier with the bread and scones, working your way systematically to the bottom and eating the chocolates last.”
The scene is intriguing: a concerned social worker is explaining the above process to a group of homeless men. They are crowded securely out of the piercing fingers of a brisk cold wind just inside the entrance alcove of an old retail store. Behind them, in front of the boarded door, a warming fire burns slowly within an upright, rusty barrel that shows the damage of many fires. The men look on with keen interest. There are four of them: Billy, tall, emaciated; Randy, short, lumbering with vacuous eyes; Marvin, an older man with heavy wrinkles; and Brad, average height but over weight, apparently well-fed despite his homeless state.
They are all routinely dressed cumbersomely to avoid the sharp winds of the downtown weather. Each has some type of hat on; two, in fact, Randy and Brad, wear the knitted style that fits the top of the head and covers the ears like a glove. Billy wears a thin baseball cap he has pulled down tightly to the tops of his ears, making him look like a little boy who doesn’t know how to put on a hat. Marvin has on a felt cowboy hat with the sides pulled down over his ears, like the wool flaps of an old World War II flight cap.
They seem interested by the presenter’s comments, grunting occasionally to encourage him. Somehow all this seems to make sense even though a delicate, expensive china cup is being used to demonstrate usage, and the presenter is dressed impeccably in neat attire. When the dessert segment is broached, one man comments about his ignorance in using donuts improperly. The social worker is ecstatic. He smiles broadly, an infectious smile that pervades the stinging air and forces the listeners, in turn, to risk breaking the icy plaster of their faces with a similar smile. Teaching has been successful and learning has been effected. The world has a future and life can continue as it was, unabated, unchanged through the centuries.
Arkansas Interludes
Arkansas Interludes
En route from Memphis back to Springfield early on Sunday morning, I stopped by a McDonald's restaurant in Marked Tree, Arkansas. As carried my bacon, egg, and cheese biscuit, along with a much needed cup of coffee, to a table, I noticed a group of older men congregated at a table behind the napkin and fork counter. All were apparently planters, most probably retired. I have seen their counter parts in many areas of the country: good ole boys who meet regularly, sometimes everyday, to bond and exchange well-trodden information. Their appearances were typical: nondescript: jeans, baseball hats with advertising or cute phrases on them, heavy coats, big pot bellies, and unkempt hair. But two in particular caught my attention. One was overweight wearing an insulated hat and a heavy insulated coat. He didn't say much, only sat and listened to the others. Between his front teeth, he firmly clutched a long McDonald's stirring wand which he constantly waved up and down as though this helped him to concentrate. The other man had a leathery, weathered emaciated face which was permanently formed into either an exaggerated smile or a grimace. I couldn't tell which. A large knit cap was pulled snugly down over his head. His eyes were bright, resting just beneath the rolled up folds of the hat. The grin-grimace contours of his face presented the air that he was up to something, perhaps impishly tricking his listening audience.
This seemed important because his conversation was about the deceased country singer Hank Williams. As I devoured my biscuit, it occurred to me that only in rural Arkansas could I find a group of people remotely interested in a country singer who had been dead for over fifty years; one who had never heard of by most of the younger generation. However, this group considered the information to be current stuff. It seems that he personally knew the man who was with Hank Williams the night he died of an overdose of something in the back seat of a car while on the way to a gig. His vicarious story affirmed that “other people” had told a lot of tales about Hank Williams' death, but his source had personally been there and knew the real facts about what happened. The other men commented on their approval of this event without bothering to ask how they could confirm that this was not just another fictitious tale.
The conversation went long. And when I left, I realized that this moment, this brief experience neither important nor monumental, is the fabric of which our conscious journey through the decades is made. This moment probably should have been forgettable, but I knew I wouldn't. These men and I would never again be in the same place or the same time. We had met without their realization, but they would be stored forever as part of my remembered experiences
A few months later, I again found myself in an Arkansas McDonalds, this time in West Memphis. As I ate my pancakes and sausage, I observed an aging farmer, coveralls, hat and all, sitting across from an equally aging black man. Both appeared to be in their late seventies; both ate bacon, sausage, and cheese biscuits. Both slowly drank their coffee between halting bites and conversed in low tones. What intrigued me was a reflection about their age and the history of this area to which they were clearly tied: long time artificial distinctions between a black man and a white man. Surely in their youth they would have been drastically separated by physical and ideological concerns, if not outright aliens to each other.
I have no idea what circumstances prompted their coming together. Age seemed to have washed out the foolishness of culture leaving only the vibrant contact and friendship between two human beings. Age had become an equalizer: youth, vitality, knowledge, and history reduced to the common denominator of what is essential in the social experience of man. These former things are transitory; what is not is the ability of men to reach out and understand each other. I realized that when we are in the grave our convoluted thoughts and opinions become nothing, even incredulous to another generation. This was a beautiful moment, and I left enriched, changed. Through the juxtaposition of these two relics emanating from a horrid past, I somehow saw a microcosm of what can be crystallized into a gem when our vain struggle to uphold pride, false heritages, and erroneous opinions fail.
I carried these experiences back to my high school English students as an assignment. Probably, they will all regularly meet at the same places, creating their own brand of meaning in lives, to an outsider, that could be classified as mundane. Interesting, they will never know they were noticed and have been the subject of a writing assignment in a Missouri high school classroom
En route from Memphis back to Springfield early on Sunday morning, I stopped by a McDonald's restaurant in Marked Tree, Arkansas. As carried my bacon, egg, and cheese biscuit, along with a much needed cup of coffee, to a table, I noticed a group of older men congregated at a table behind the napkin and fork counter. All were apparently planters, most probably retired. I have seen their counter parts in many areas of the country: good ole boys who meet regularly, sometimes everyday, to bond and exchange well-trodden information. Their appearances were typical: nondescript: jeans, baseball hats with advertising or cute phrases on them, heavy coats, big pot bellies, and unkempt hair. But two in particular caught my attention. One was overweight wearing an insulated hat and a heavy insulated coat. He didn't say much, only sat and listened to the others. Between his front teeth, he firmly clutched a long McDonald's stirring wand which he constantly waved up and down as though this helped him to concentrate. The other man had a leathery, weathered emaciated face which was permanently formed into either an exaggerated smile or a grimace. I couldn't tell which. A large knit cap was pulled snugly down over his head. His eyes were bright, resting just beneath the rolled up folds of the hat. The grin-grimace contours of his face presented the air that he was up to something, perhaps impishly tricking his listening audience.
This seemed important because his conversation was about the deceased country singer Hank Williams. As I devoured my biscuit, it occurred to me that only in rural Arkansas could I find a group of people remotely interested in a country singer who had been dead for over fifty years; one who had never heard of by most of the younger generation. However, this group considered the information to be current stuff. It seems that he personally knew the man who was with Hank Williams the night he died of an overdose of something in the back seat of a car while on the way to a gig. His vicarious story affirmed that “other people” had told a lot of tales about Hank Williams' death, but his source had personally been there and knew the real facts about what happened. The other men commented on their approval of this event without bothering to ask how they could confirm that this was not just another fictitious tale.
The conversation went long. And when I left, I realized that this moment, this brief experience neither important nor monumental, is the fabric of which our conscious journey through the decades is made. This moment probably should have been forgettable, but I knew I wouldn't. These men and I would never again be in the same place or the same time. We had met without their realization, but they would be stored forever as part of my remembered experiences
A few months later, I again found myself in an Arkansas McDonalds, this time in West Memphis. As I ate my pancakes and sausage, I observed an aging farmer, coveralls, hat and all, sitting across from an equally aging black man. Both appeared to be in their late seventies; both ate bacon, sausage, and cheese biscuits. Both slowly drank their coffee between halting bites and conversed in low tones. What intrigued me was a reflection about their age and the history of this area to which they were clearly tied: long time artificial distinctions between a black man and a white man. Surely in their youth they would have been drastically separated by physical and ideological concerns, if not outright aliens to each other.
I have no idea what circumstances prompted their coming together. Age seemed to have washed out the foolishness of culture leaving only the vibrant contact and friendship between two human beings. Age had become an equalizer: youth, vitality, knowledge, and history reduced to the common denominator of what is essential in the social experience of man. These former things are transitory; what is not is the ability of men to reach out and understand each other. I realized that when we are in the grave our convoluted thoughts and opinions become nothing, even incredulous to another generation. This was a beautiful moment, and I left enriched, changed. Through the juxtaposition of these two relics emanating from a horrid past, I somehow saw a microcosm of what can be crystallized into a gem when our vain struggle to uphold pride, false heritages, and erroneous opinions fail.
I carried these experiences back to my high school English students as an assignment. Probably, they will all regularly meet at the same places, creating their own brand of meaning in lives, to an outsider, that could be classified as mundane. Interesting, they will never know they were noticed and have been the subject of a writing assignment in a Missouri high school classroom
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