Recent Poetry

Don't Bother Me

Please don't bother me.
I've just discovered
I know nothing
And am reeling
With the news.

Though,
On second thought,
As it seems
This ignorance
May not end soon,
Go ahead.
Bother me.

May your bothering
Find a home
In my not-knowing
And provide
Some consolation
As I reel.

Theology

It's the smile
The baby offers
To the grandmother
In whose arms he's held:
A bearing-of-witness
To that perception of
What he'll later
Come to call
Love.
And she smiles back,
At that honest
Articulation,
So incomplete
And beautiful.

When, later,
His theology expands
To include
The first, angry
"Mine!"
She smiles again,
Hoping he'll
Get over it,
But knowing
There's little
She can do.

Robert Lax (1915-2000)

Like the leaf

That falls

And then,

Powerless as God,

Finds the journey

Earthward

Complicated

By waves

Of atmosphere,

So fell Lax.

If it weren’t for

The famous

Friend who called

Our attention to it,

This leaf-fall might

Have gone almost

Unobserved,

In the midst of

Worthier matters.

For such leaves

When noticed

At all, are

Quickly

Categorized:

Dreamy,

Naïve,

Mystical,

Impractical,

Even holy;

So that our worthier

Matters aren’t

Threatened.

But, in this case,

Upon recommendation

Of his friends,

We looked,

And thus observed the leaf

drift down lightly,

Grazing the categories

Without touching them,

In a gentle suggestion of

What life

Could be:

Every complication of the

Earthward ride

An occasion of wonder

And gratitude,

With as much

Rejoicing in

Arrival at the

Destination

As there was

In every moment

Of the way down.