TU Advisory

Is there an echo in here?

I could swear I heard that same gunfire just last night:

The first shot, Isolated, hesitant,

Then an answering triplet when the shooter concludes

He's past the Point of No Return.

The next morning Campus Safety tells the story

Sterilized: a block and time, a shooting in two

Sentences, with no blood. And the news breaks

And we reflect again on the tension:

Gentrified Temple, our ivory tower

Just a block too near the slums.

On Friday night

Drunken twenty-something white kids in troupes

Troop past drunken forty-something residents on stoops

We fear their violence; they hate our arrogance

And chafe with the disparity of opportunity

Too close to home to ignore.

On Eleventh Street, a foreign studies major

Buys groceries for a fifty-something neighbor

With arthritic knees. She invites him to dinner.

It's a good story, a better story,

But it lacks the gunpowder to resonate.

I N V U

When I say I envy

You, I mean I envy

The choices and chances you had,

Nothing more.  See, love,

I used to say, love,

That the world never stops

For us, that there is no pause

In life's brutal rhythm,

And whatever it throws at us,

Our tired feet must find

Some way to stay in step.

But that wasn't true

For you, was it?

When you fell apart, everything

Ground to a halt—I 

Ground to a halt—

But for every dollar and every

Day spent on your well-being

You couldn't be well.

I never got that opportunity. 

The drums never stopped

Beating for me; throbbing behind

My temples in the space between

Asleep and awake.  I was left to wait

To watch our money run out without

Your income and try to keep

Our roof over my head.

There was no recovery for me

No respite from the hard world

On Daddy's dime.  I never told you:

I couldn't cry for four months after

You left.  Careening on the brink, I wrote

Truth disguised as fiction and fiction

disguised as poetry.  Finally it all poured

Out, sobs and screams and the words

“I love you every damn day—”

I still do, you know, though

Every damn day now your fingerprints

Fade a little more from my skin. 

Once I admitted I was in mourning

I couldn't stop.  I sank deeper into it

With each month.  But still there was

No rest: I had bills to pay and flooded

Apartments to flee: It's not always sunny

Here, no matter what the television says.

Not all of us get to live at a halfway

House in a Florida suburb. 

Every raindrop was another beat,

And I kept my bloody feet dancing

And threw back my head and sang

Sisyphus' song: I embraced

My rugged fate.

But beneath reality's callus

There's still that boy in me

Who drove six hours to take

You dancing on the sand

That night you felt too alien

To face your own senior prom.

I envy the choices and chances

You had.  If you'd given the same

To me, maybe this could have lived.

We Shall Not

'We shall not be moved'

Rings hollow when we're picked

Up and thrown out, kicking

And screaming The Whole World

Is Watching—but there's a blind

Spot when the cameramen

Are the first to go. 

There's a gang of boys stomping

Anthills: it's so much easier

To kick something over than

To create it.  We might look

Like insects under your boot but

Damnit we toiled for this

Two months undone in hours.

Resurrection City is in

A dumpster in Lower Manhattan,

Our footprints pressure-washed

Away. I had a dream

until

The helicopters enforcing

The no-fly zone woke me up.

Justice for all is a city

councilman arrested

bleeding from the head. The nexus

In our protest against corporations

In bed with government is policed

By a billionaire mayor sleeping

With a Brookfield Properties chair.

Now what can we say? We

Shall Not—what, Be Silenced?

That works, until brain damage

Leaves us mute.  We Shall Not

Be Subverted Or Privatized—

They're noble words, but

Time will tell. 

I can only promise this:

WE SHALL NOT go gentle into that

Good night.  Forgive me, America,

If this sounds like a shot fired;

I meant no offense.  Don't take

these words too harshly; it's a jest,

A rubber bullet.

Docutrines of Grace

In full disclosure:

I think I always knew

You wouldn't choose

Me.  Every weekend, singing

Your songs, something about that

Harmony rang hollow in the space

Between my soul and solar

Plexus.  There were potted tulips

By the podium last time I dragged

Myself to Your house of praise. 

It was high spring.  I haven't returned.

Now everything is falling and rotting

Like Your greatest disciples said this

World would. I was going to be one

Of them once, a warrior for You, at least

I told myself—but there was always

That falling, rotting doubt stuck deep,

Like glass embedded in my sole, scraping

As I tried to march toward You. 

I've read some books and I know now

That You built this into me:

The Blood of the Lamb

Is only enough for so many,

After all. 

Welcome to the cosmic kickball game:

I'm back in middle school gym class

Waiting against the wall

God and the Devil dividing up teams

For the Armageddon playoff.

I'm straining forward when You look at me

And there's this glow in Your eyes like

Pity—not enough, though, to change

Your choice.  You need a faster runner,

A stronger kicker, and I'm left watching

As they heed the call to Your side. 

Irresistible grace

Means they couldn't say no if they

Tried, like total depravity

Means for all my desperate glances

I'm powerless when the Adversary comes.

We all go to our separate locker rooms

Just like you planned it before the dawn

Of time. Remember that,

When you preheat the lake of fire for me.

Do I get a consolation prize?  All

These years running after You

Seem wasted if I was never

Meant to catch up.  Your best

Scholars wrote books on election

And they say only You elect:

My choice is predestined.

Maybe that's why Holy Writ

Turns to ash in my mouth.

In a limited atonement economy

There's no upward mobility;

My perseverance never meant a

Damn thing, but pardon me if I can't

Take my damnation like a man. 

I have a few questions before I begin

My weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Before You formed me in the womb

You knew me and marked me to burn:

What kind of god is that?  Will You

Answer for Yourself, Adonai,

Or as kindling for the flames am I

Still unworthy of speech? Our Father

Who Art In Heaven, You have

To say something

Abba

Daddy

Please

I don't know

Why You're doing this

I'm smaller and weaker

And I know I was never

Your favorite son

But I'm still your son, dammit,

I'm still your son