Skimming Stones
Bo Gordy-Stith
Even You Cannot Save
(Beyond reach of your power/ at the place of crossing from
Desire to destiny set in motion/ Long ago by unknowing conspirators)
She Cries When she dances...1998
Help us fly to heaven
(I have no wings for heaven
cannot see how I'll arrive)
Sudanese Summer
(When
the soldiers rained down death
I feasted on my tears)
Israel (They called
themselves night wrestlers,
strugglers, wondering in the desert)
Lessons Learned (echoes
of love) (Love is a commodity
(Lay your head on my lap and sleep))
Going... gone
(Tara slept with hers; Chris Witty took a bite.)
Plain Speaking (What good's a
blessing unredeemable this side of heaven)
Maker Meet (The day God came to church
fear flooded hearts like wind-swept tide)
For Bryan, in the First Degree (When
he died, I got so jealous it surprised me)
Good-bye, Michelle (When
the police come, I want them to find my body and this note.)
1997
Bailing (Summer harvest, bailing
time)
Ahnentafel (The records testify
your sojourn here a time)
Darkening Skies (If I weren't an
alcoholic I'd have had a beer for you)
Questions I'd Ask You
(Was I a twinkle in Your eye... ?)
Contact (People
cry ‘Peace!' (How we need to
believe))
...or die trying (My daughter awoke,
crying, in the dead of night)
God Bound (The world is full of
fall, a time of bringing home the sheaves.)
Boy Child
(When I first saw you, Plumbed from depth of Mother's
womb too soon. . .)
Safe Keeping
(An old priest stroked his beard and smiled on me with
loving eyes)
Lead the Way
(You are as beautiful to me today as when I caught my
breath so long ago at brush of you.)
Tallying
the Score (Long before the vote was taken I had been convinced .
. . )
I have not words for you (I have
not words for you to say when we meet, )
StreetSong (I never start out with
some plan to smoke crack)
Dead Letter (Hey Paul, Got your
note Friday morning at work)
1996
Remembrance (It's months ago they
buried you -- your body's wasting now)
Vista (You, always fleeing from the
only love you've known)
Hello, My Name is Aliceson (In
the din of the check-out at Food Lion (with Christmas approaching) I yearned
to be scanned)
Texaco Rendezvous (I (on the phone)
passed the paper to you (in your book))
Rush Hour (I strain to see your face
beyond the intervening safe-T-glass)
Disengage ("I guess this is where
we say 'bye'")
Tightrope Dancers (Laughing, we
speak about matters unspeakable)
A Note to Follow Paul (I envied
you the day you hovered on the hospital bed)
Summer Spectacular (The sun-bronzed
gods of the lakeside take to the air from the springboard)
We Danced the Macarena (One, two,
over, over)
Aly's Happy Haiku (Today I tired
and tried to live towards the sun.)
How I Made My First Million (You
who stand in awe should know that my turn at the wheel began with no great
aspirations.)
Best to Receive (Grace-fall -- a
gentle, soaking rain from which I seek no shelter;)
1995
A Song for Joy (Came into World
a helpless girl-child rolling eyes at ceiling)
Reveille (Have you ever watched
the sun move early in the dawning of the day)
A Thief in Our Midst (An old house
full of gathered strangers become intimates too soon)
Destiny (What if the journey were
the destiny? Could I content myself with traveling?)
Reunion (We touched a sacred place
today while hiding, covering our tracks)
A Prayer for Friday (Oh, I was a
poet once)
1994
God Only Knows (Why was the tree
in the Garden?)
Wash Day (Rain, soak me to my essence/
Saturate my skin and hair)
Calling (My Child,/ Climb into
my pitcher -- let me pour you gently into cup)
philadelphia (I laid all my shame
on the Scapegoat)
flight (a tenuous tether holds me
to the fire/ and in the windy fullness/ of life)
Reckoned Righteousness (He watched
the battle rage below Ensconced upon the mountain)
Happily Ever After (Someone asked
me today why they all have happy endings)
Killing Fatted Calf (Tomorrow
I'll tell them that I cannot take a job that keeps me from
forgotten churches)
Re-Entry (Recently I was in an
accident:/ a head-on collision/ of symbol and reality.)
Can't Take "No" for Answer (Every
time we speak a "No," we clasp death's hand too dearly)
Terms of Passion (I'm learning to
provide a way for my Desire to say so -- )
Know Who I Am? (I weep openly at
movies, in books and images when they're true)
Making Peace (Reflecting in the
dentist's chair the other day I asked about prevention)
1st Place (Was I a football player?/
Or a wrestler, animal-instinct, go-for-the-jugular guy?)
Making Something of Ourselves (I
struggled for words in the early this morning Before you
had risen from slumber.)
‘Til Death Do You Part (Do you know
what it is to be raised from a dead Sleep when the apartment
shakes)
John Loves Susan to Death (They
met in the same place as at the first, where (this time) He
killed them)
A Theological Poem (This one's
gonna come out like fire I just know it)
Theologizing Made Easy (I sat
in the lounge with my schoolmates, having a rare theological discussion.)
Easter eve, 1994 (He did not treat
happiness about life as a thing to be grasped)
Charism (Fruits, these gifts I
give to you, my child)
Descent (We held fast for a day
at the last plateau before the valley)
Cinco de Mayo ‘94 (Haven't written
a whole lot lately. Not exactly sure why; )
This Must be Love (We almost fooled
them all, we did)
Spring Cleaning (This spot won't
out from on my soul a killing field)
A Song for Lance (I never once
wrote one for you,)
Reflections of a Family (Shortly
I will leave you in my following a Calling you enabled
me to hear.)
Now and Not Yet (We are called from
our darkness to live life a new Way
Enfleshing ourselves with new garments)
Spring Gleaning (I discovered
a passion once
and spent it falsely on a bargain
of my own making --)
Feathering Fields (I have longed
to write of the chickens whose carcasses rot in fields)
If only you could know . . . (Broken,
sacrificed Like bruiséd reed you trod me down)
Will Thy Will in Me (I saw myself
as God would see)
Veteran's Day Prayer, 1994 (O
God, help us to remember)
Birthing Stool (I sing a song
at Christmas-time, of joy that fills the air
A babe is born in Bethlehem, and no one seems to care)
1993
Spring Reign (I am a disciple
of Jesus Christ -- Sovereign over all the earth
But that tells you so little about me.)
Journal Entry: "Wind In Our
Faces (I recalled an ancient center this am. A warm, glowing
spot of contentment in my life. )
Reflections (There was no sun
today. But we had light to live by nonetheless.)
Song of a Sandcastle (I walked as
the tide fell and saw ancient relics
Of yesterday's castles Built high and laid
low.)
To a Friend in Hiding (You battle
incognito to defend your Transcendent Father against emotionals
who profane Him with their selfish demands.)
Healing Celebration (to Joseph
Seffan)
(I saw the news this morning Proclaiming joy and shame
Six winters for a judge to right A lie about
your name.)
1987
Surprise (Poetry happens when
one stops to listen To sounds that her heart Has
been trying to send)
Waterborne (I've heard of a bird
called the Albatross)
To Marry (Strange, that two people
can enter Into a life-long contract without
Really knowing exactly what it means.)
Autumn Trade Waves (Deployment's
moved back. Plans of togetherness wash down the side)
Together Trust (Though I'm lately
lonely without you
On my ship across the seas I see your face
in crimson skies -- I hear you in the breeze.)
Song of Sadness (The rain washes
tears down the streets of Olongapo
Into the sewers and out towards the sea)
Presence (The sun broke through
the morning as
the mooring lines
were doubled)
The Nineteenth Song (The heavens
proclaim God's glory -- the skies your handiwork.)
1986
The Harvest (Thoughts become actions
When conscience grows tired
And chance leaps from habit
Limbs practiced and fired.)
Race (She softly sleeps beside me
as the Night races on with his burden)
1985
Nearer (A faraway whistle once beckoned
my yearning For dreams that have since become tangible.)
Song (Hey -- I wonder if they'll ever
know
Or ever want to know
Where we got the melody
Or how we got the lines.)
1982
Keith and Eugene (I don't understand
why they do it;
Why Keith and Eugene keep on trying.)
I'd love to know what you think.
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