Other fields, other ground
to till, to tend, to watch,
to shepherd other flocks
offering welcome, hope,
a vision of God’s love
in other times, other places
Other work, for the kingdom
for God’s glory, the hope of mankind
sharing gifts in unplanned ways
following the call to serve
wherever he may lead
June 29, 2008
Matthew 10:40-42,
1 Corinthians 3:5-9
and sermon by Pastor Ruth L. Foss,
“Changes”, and children’s sermon by Pastor Ruth L. Foss,
“Welcome”, Sanbornville United Methodist Church,
Wakefield, NH
Impossible questions, real-life questions
rang through the church this week,
hard painful impossible questions of loss
of death in sudden and agonizingly long ways
of young lives lost to cancer, to SIDS,
of questions and loss for so many who knew them
who knew their parents, of the cascade of memory
that we all carry of our losses in this human life
when one we loved was lost
to the mystery of the time of death
the choosing of God, beyond our comprehension
and oh so far beyond our explanations
questions of the children left hanging in the air
frozen like the air itself will be all too soon
in the cold of winter
But we share the gift of the belief
in the resurrection and the coming of the kingdom
so we have an answer for death
in the promise of that future
however far off it may be
November 19, 2006 21:54
A fence of wattles
Placed just so in the mud
shaped in labyrinth
out in the current
by the landing, in the channel
An old fashioned tool
Spring to Winter
Sentinels in the water
Tended by the lone fisher
Anachronistic in modern times
a fish weir in the river
named for an eel.
1/1/06 17:10
From my memory of the weir in the Lamprey River, in downtown Newmarket, NH in 1982/1983.
What was the weather forecast,
what did they say? Black ice?
Words that harken back, bring me
to a moment of sadness, of loss
Seeing you, the car, the chaos
Black ice, no control, nowhere to go
between the shoulders, the lines,
unknown when or where
the ice had taken over
where the surface was no more
and the ice was in control
Hidden danger, black ice
December 12, 2007
The Son, the holy Word
seated at the right hand
of the Father, the Creator
A way of understanding
the relationship, the single entity
the being that is God,
to the extent there is a sense of a body at all
For we only see that which our eyes see
that which we can quantify, touch, experience
So much more beyond that
beyond human understanding,
so easy to understand that idea,
because of the new discoveries of science each day
Seated at the right hand,
the favored seat, of the family business
What better advocate
than the one who walked to the skull
climbed the cross
to atone for our stain
October 17, 2007 1:23pm
part of the Apostle’s Creed
A flurry of motion
descended on the ripe flower
new, open, uncovered nectar
fragrant bloom blazing yellow
Plate of color, expectant
laying a welcome
for the buzzing crowd
August 24, 2007 17:04
There before the start
the one who made the heavens
the one who made us
January 19, 2008
She was wistfully watching
the activity at the edge of the lake
her sisters laughing, splashing,
playing in the waves lapping
the shore, in the sand, with
shovels, buckets, and pails
Wistfully watching her sisters
at play by the lake
from her timeout seat.
July 31, 2007 20:51
Returning from whence it grew
the scaled cap of last year’s acorn
becoming part of the dirt, the soil
the earth at the base of the mighty oak
becoming silted by the ground
slowly being subsumed, captured
by the land where it fell
returning to dust
as we all must
October 10, 2006 18:57
It was the incongruity
the foreign color, out of place
sand camouflage on the Humvee
merging with me, on the city street
rimmed with dirty white
snow piles, days after the storm
He was in the Hummer
in my rearview
Guard fatigues, short, just-cut hair
A butt cupped, awkwardly
in his hand, as if
hiding the glowing tip
from sniper fire
outside the Green Zone
in downtown Baghdad.
I wonder if he knows
what it looks like
to an observer, in the rearview.
Had he lived that life
when a dim cigarette ember
could have cost him his life?
Would he have to go back?
March 7, 2008
Canal Street, Manchester, NH
