Living on a flood plain
Some days it drizzles –
a black man's tail light fails him;
a toddler finds daddy's new toy.
Some days it pours –
the music stops pulsing for late night dancers,
revelers storm the Bastille for the last time.
But every day the waters rise,
stalk their unwitting prey.
The boot strap cracks widen,
threaten to breech the dam,
to drown us in post-disaster anarchy.
As the red waters fill our basements
and soak our carpets
we retreat to the rooftops
throwing daggers with one breath –
someone must be at fault, after all,
someone must pay –
and in the next desperately calling help, help
as we wait for the helicopters and rescue boats
that never seem to come.
Used once or twice and put away,
the Starcraft stored in the garage,
upon whose bow we had proudly
painted its name in our piety:
The Golden Rule,
slumbers,
a forgotten gift.
©2016 Kenneth W. Arthur
Advent is a time of waiting. We await the birth of the Christ child but perhaps even more importantly we await what the Christ child represents: change. Christ brings us the promise of a new way of living in the world, a new way of doing and being. Into our current world that is so obsessed with greed and power, love is born. But Advent isn’t just about waiting as if God is suddenly going to solve our problems. It’s about an active waiting, anticipating and preparing for how we can participate in this new world – how we can help bring hope by creating peace and justice in our lives and in our society.
In the eleventh chapter of Isaiah, the prophet also gave the people of Israel a vision of a different kind of world. This was a world where “common sense” was turned upside down and where the wolf and the lamb lived in peace. Not a world where the lamb defeated the wolf in battle but where they learned to live harmoniously. A world where the lamb no longer needed to fear. Is Isaiah’s words, this would be a world filled with the knowledge of God, a world without violence or oppression for if we truly know the love of God we cannot do violence and harm to others.
For us who follow Christ, we understand this vision of a different way to be fulfilled in Christ. By knowing Christ we know God. But simple knowledge of doctrines concerning Christ isn’t enough. We also need to “know” Christ as we know a trusted friend. We need to know Christ in our hearts and not just our heads for it is in our hearts where transformation and growth must take place. How we act in the world doesn’t change unless our hearts change. How do we do this? Can we forget about doctrines and whether we’re believing the “right” things and just feel the presence of Christ, of love, in our hearts? Perhaps what we really anticipate during Advent is the birth of Christ into our hearts, continually, that we might be set upon a path of transformation and love.
This Advent, let us in our anticipation make room in our hearts for the birth of the love of Christ that we might be transformed and in turn begin to transform the world. For where there is love, there is hope. Let in the Spirit of God this Advent that it may bring us the wisdom and courage we need to create a new world where the wolf and lamb live together in peace, where we stand up for the oppressed, where people are treated fairly with compassion. This Advent let us be God’s love to the world.
(I originally wrote this short reflection for my church’s newsletter. It was inspired by my sermon from Sunday, December 4, 2016. The church’s website is http://www.phoenixchurch.org)
Modern Monsters
Life-sucking vampires
preach a prosperity gospel:
Give us your blood,
it'll trickle back down again.
Not in time to save your ass,
but you can't have everything.
Mindless zombies
create converts:
Give us your brain,
let the mob do your thinking.
The world will go to hell
but it will be a ride to remember.
Frenzied werewolves
seduce the soul:
Give us your vitality,
we'll change the world –
not if it means compromise,
but at least we have our principles.
Unfocused full moon rage.
Unrepentant full time death.
When the zombies and vampires team up
the werewolves run scared.
©2016 Kenneth W. Arthur
Postscript to Wendell Berry's Mad Farmer Manifesto Walk a mile in the crazy angry farmer's overalls and join the ranks of perturbed earth-lovers trying to grow majestic oaks in rank swamp land. Maybe the mad farmer should have gone Luther on their asses and nailed his manifesto to every church door in America instead of writing a poem. Who listens to poets, anyway? What was this angry agriculturist trying to grow? Food to nourish the body? Revolutionaries for the new reality which was never to be? Maybe just some wacky tobacky? But the farmer gives good manifesto: Care more about your unborn grandchildren than yourselves. Worry about something other than profit. Be counter-cultural. Practice Resurrection.
Many of the people I love are in deep pain this morning. Many of us this morning are fearful and grieving. We are wondering where we find hope for the future as we awake to the surreal reality that our country has elected the candidate of homophobia, xenophobia, misogyny, and white supremacy. The candidate who has promised to take away affordable health insurance and any implement any number of other policies that will prop up the power of white, straight, rich men to the detriment of anyone who isn’t that.
I can’t yet wrap my brain around it. I don’t understand it. I am discouraged and saddened. I am particularly discouraged that those who identify as evangelical Christians seem to have overwhelmingly voted for this new reality. Nothing about this is Christian. It doesn’t come from an ethic of love your neighbor, the core of the true gospel. It instead screams hate and fear your neighbor. That form of so-called Christianity cannot die fast enough.
Although, for now, I may be struggling with my faith in humanity, I do still have trust in my God. I still trust that love wins in the end. That is the true meaning of the irrational message of resurrection. And, yes, it is irrational. If I were being rational right now I’d have to give into the despair. I’m not willing to do that. I choose to put my trust in the belief that love wins in the end. Love is the very core of our being, even those who choose to live out of their fear. I’ll put my faith in love.
We have a lot of work to do. Things may get much worse before they get better again. There may be even more new realities to deal with in the next months and years. It will take time to try to understand each other again, to forgive each other. But we must.
Take time to grieve and then remind yourself that there is still love in the world. And where there is love there is hope. Then let’s redouble our efforts and get back to work.
Openings
cht cht
plop plop
tok tok
drip drip
What is the sound of water
penetrating the crack in the ceiling?
tap tap tapping into my brain
Chinese water torture disturbing my slumber
eroding my walls rotting their foundation
un-mended the opening expands
a growing obsession an incessant knocking
a flash flood threatening to undermine the ramparts
cht plop tok drip
What is the sound of love
penetrating my soul?
©2016 Kenneth W. Arthur
Living on a flood plain
Some days it drizzles –
a black man's tail light fails him,
a toddler finds daddy's new toy.
Some days it pours –
the music stops pulsing for late night dancers,
revelers storm the Bastille for the last time.
But every day the waters inch higher,
the boot strap cracks widen,
threatening to overwhelm the dam
that holds back the reservoir,
seeking to drown us in post-disaster anarchy.
As the red waters fill our basements
and soak our carpets
we retreat to the rooftops
throwing accusatory daggers with one breath –
someone must be at fault, after all,
someone must pay –
and in the next desperately calling help, help
as we wait for the helicopters and rescue boats
that never seem to come.
The Starcraft stored in the garage,
upon whose bow, in our Christian piety,
we had proudly painted its name: The Golden Rule,
slumbers,
used once or twice
and put away,
a forgotten gift.
©2016 Kenneth W. Arthur
The Eschaton: Upon Dreaming of a Barren Land, Bigfoot, and Kris Kristofferson as God* Sunday Mornin' Comin' Down the barren boulevard, an urban desert, exploded skyscrapers gape, disembodied toothless grins stacked one upon the other. At the neighborhood park, mirth burned away, the playground merry-go-round spins, draped with the body of a dead child. “They Killed Him and all the rest,” I wail, haunted by the laughter of impish ghosts wanting one more ride. A final act of salvation, God walks into the haze of my despair, flowing gray hair parted in the middle, beard neatly trimmed, with the air of divine confidence one expects in a deity. He asks me to call him Kris, of all things, and gestures at the world around us – “Loving Her Was Easier (Than Anything I’ll Ever Do Again).” His forehead, with more wrinkles than an old prune, and his eyes, squinting as if he had stared into a thousand fire plumes, betray his distress. “The Taker will return,” he warns, “it can't be stopped now.” He beckons me to follow and I wander a labyrinth of rubble, The Pilgrim, Chapter 33 of an endless story, seeking sacred refuge from endless horror. Finally, a green oasis, sanctuary, arises to swallow us whole and I behold the sights and sounds of creation's gathered remnants, frightened and amazed. Have you ever heard? A sasquatch, arms wrenched from their sockets, howl in pain as if to ask “Why Me?” Have you ever seen? A velociraptor, last of its kind, wander aimlessly, looking For the Good Times. But Kris simply sits on a stump of a forgotten tree in this forgotten Eden, buries his head in his hands and sobs. Only once more does he look at me, as if to plead “Help Me Make It Through the Night.” Even God doesn't know what to do next. Please Don't Tell Me How the Story Ends. *Italicized phrases are Kris Kristofferson song titles taken from http://tasteofcountry.com/kris-kristofferson-songs/. ©2016 Kenneth W. Arthur
Have you ever had a dream in which someone was chasing or attacking you? In dreams like this the attacker represents our Shadow, where we shove all of those aspects of ourselves of which we are ashamed, hoping that they never see the light of day. When the Shadow shows up in our dreams it is basically our subconscious telling us that some repressed part of ourselves needs attention. The world-renowned Jungian analyst Robert Johnson wrote that if the Shadow gains enough energy “it erupts as an overpowering rage or some indiscretion that slips past us; or we have a depression or an accident that seems to have its own purpose.” An out of control Shadow “is a terrible monster in our psychic house.” In other words, the Shadow escapes our nightmares and becomes a real life problem causing pain and disruption for us and those around us.
Donald Trump is the Shadow of American culture. He is the nightmare that reminds us of the misogyny, racism, xenophobia, islamophobia, etc. that lurks just below the surface. We’ve tried to deny and repress these aspects of our culture. We’ve tried to claim that women are given equal treatment, that black lives already matter, that we welcome the stranger, that we offer religious freedom, but Trump is revealing the falsehood of our delusions. He is our Shadow demanding attention. He is an eruption of rage, an indiscretion. As the raging Shadow, it’s not surprising that his entire persona has no real substance. He doesn’t offer plans or ideas but only anger and vague, grandiose boasting. It’s not his function to solve anything but only to demand attention.
An Afternoon Hike
The adirondack stands watch upon the hill,
a lonely sentinel overlooking the meadow,
the Queen's Guard protecting the palace
as ambassadors of the heavens
and forest emissaries
come to consult.
Resolute in the afternoon sun,
she transforms from guard to
queen of the valley herself,
a siren singing her invitation:
“Come, come to me, rest your weary feet
and survey the peacefulness of my realm.
All this I will give you.”
Reaching her side, my gaze
wanders the majestic vista.
I turn to take my rightful place
as ruler of all I observe,
and realize I am not the first.
Countless feathered kings and queens
have sat upon this throne before me.
Sometimes,
to feel like royalty,
one has to sit in shit.
©2016 Kenneth W. Arthur