"organist" poems
A most pious man
whose well-tempered music
brushed the cobwebs
from the throne of God
Evolution was made manifest
across deep time
these lyrical figures
achieve the same purpose
in the space between the morning star
and the dawn
A fallow field
is sewn with pearls
a moonlit beach
illuminated by shadow
every scrape of the fiddler's bow
merges mind with the present
harvests the meaning
in the moment
The composer
that good man
was
for a time
church organist at St. John's
its notable steeple leaning
all askew
as a rebuke against God
or perhaps the drunken architect
A finger of candlelight
plays across the manuscript
a fugue echoes
through the still church
And though no living person
on that still winter's night
shares the organist's solemn delight
the stirring mass of possibility
that is posterity
awaits
Oct 9, 2016
Oct 9, 2016 at 5:49 PM UTC
Softly and steadily we munch
A roller motion action
As we gently pass over
Living in a contented silence
Randomly we each call
Hollow pipes we are played
By the holy organist
As life plays its tune
Understood be very few
As we submit to the herd
And spiral around a oneness
Mooing and mooing
With a great gusto
We send out O's
circles spiraling
Softly blowing bubbles
With an oily shine
We are carried forward
In these bulbs of light
Air filled with vibration
Caressing and holding
Our community with
An invisible film
As we all feel this
Light headed embrace
And the golden ring of community
Is placed on our finger
We say "YES YES YES "
For we love her very much
Living free of hierarchy
As everyone is equal
Servant and master
Divorced from the conflicting
Ties of politics
We are as level and free as
The planes from which we graze
Living a freedom faraway from
Rank and power
And enjoy the vast out stretching
Places where our hearts unburdened
By mountains unfold into unlimited spaces
Collapsing within each breath
We spread our Love with the ease
Of melting butter in the African sun
Far and wide
In the mating season
We may bumble around
Like bumper cars
As you can not underestimate
The force of each individual
As we bang and bang our way
Through life until opportunity knocks
Until life says yes
As our our stubbornness
Is not just the perfect No
But the perfect Yes to
And mothers reward our newborns
With her loving milk
The perfect colostrum
A silky bliss
In the expansive community
Of wildebeest and cattle
Where endless love
Can spread like water
We can learn so very much
Dec 14, 2014
Dec 14, 2014 at 7:09 AM UTC
She cannot be any more for me.
Cannot touch, cannot see or know
What it would mean to lie beside her.
Below or above or inside her.
I cannot kiss her skin enough
To satisfy my tongue,
At root, amid tonsil and gum.
There is nothing between my legs
To satisfy the ache I’ve beshouldered.
Nor to give her what she wants.
And yet to be the bearer of such lofty arms,
I have not the strength
To hold her to me, tight enough
Nor strength to let her go.
Therefore pianist or organist,
No digits can so far reach
To abrade this itch within me.
To what worldly force there is to bray,
No hips move expeditiously
Enough to shake this wanting free
Not rhetoric, charm nor Rationale
Bestow words to dissuade my need.
I have no arms to pull her closely,
Nor shape to fit her skin.
Yet I cannot be any less for her.
Jun 29, 2011
Jun 29, 2011 at 3:25 PM UTC
It was a very strange day
A day, you could say of unrest.
The day Mr Pig was wed
And wore his Sunday best.
Underneath the Duck’s frustrated wings
He had hidden a gun.
He was planning to use this weapon
Once the ceremony had begun.
The Organist commenced and
The door flung open and in she marched.
In what could only be described as a mess
That had been heavily starched.
Mr Duck felt repulsed
Somebody had failed to do their job
Mr Pig had tears in his eyes as he stared
At his white overweight blob.
Mr Pig’s pride and joy called the shots
But not the one fired from the gun
The wing took aim, the trigger released
The blob fell like the setting of the sun.
She hit the deck with an almighty thud
Mr Duck pelted into his hiding place
Where he had planned to stay the rest of the week
And the guilt wiped from his troubled little face. - to be continued ...
Aug 17, 2013
Aug 17, 2013 at 2:02 AM UTC
There is something about churches—
the sanctuary filling slowly,
brass ***** pipes arrayed like halberds
in a medieval arsenal,
stooped ushers handing out programs
as the congregation
accumulates softly
like snow.
And the pulpit—like a queen
in a hive of wooden pews
all of polished walnut,
stands hushed and expectant.
(I know within that pulpit
there is a place to put cough drops,
a legal pad, second pair of glasses.)
Sanctuaries have a peculiar smell,
redolent of potted lilies,
Youth Dew perfume,
aging hymnals,
the suspired breath
of five hundred faithful
lifting their voices to that soaring
Byzantine dome.
I was glad for your presence that day,
the sound of your marvelous
voice, the warm sense
of your shoulder next to mine.
You cradled a hymnal
benevolently in your hand
as though you were baptizing a child.
"Jesus Christ is risen today, Alleluia!"
I sang more loudly, I suppose,
for gratitude that you were with me.
I held my hymnal with more care,
sang and looked up more hopefully
to that pulpit than I might otherwise
have done on any given Easter.
I prayed more ardently for good things to happen,
thought more kindly of the man
beside me who wouldn’t make room
when we three entered the pew
but stared blandly ahead as if
waiting for an opera to begin.
When the minister spread his arms
in benediction and bade us all go in peace,
we stayed to hear the postlude
and watch the Easter crowd
wind its way to the narthex
and spill out into the boisterous
parade on Fifth Avenue.
I sat there and listened with you
as the organist played his sonorous farewell.
When I was a boy sitting next to you in church,
you might gently pat my thigh
when the organist’s final note
passed through the sanctuary
like a great bird in flight.
You would smile as if to say,
“You made it through the whole service!”
On this Easter, when the hymn began,
and the mighty ***** notes swelled around us
like God’s own voice in song,
it was the thought of your shoulder near mine,
your hands upon the pew,
that halted my singing for a moment,
to let a silent bolt of longing
pass through me
like a solitary dog crossing a road.
Then it was gone, the thought,
but so, too, was your palpable nearness,
the idea of your voice
ringing through the church
like a celebration.
Apr 19, 2017
Apr 19, 2017 at 4:45 PM UTC
i was disconnected from your umbrella,
as we strolled
like organist thumbs akimbo
over octaves of impenetrable silences
that lay as shells at our feet, unperturbed.
your free hand, bound to mine.
enslaved to the pendulum
of our quietous
tandem.
we note the long shadows swaying in the corona of emerging contrasts... we go arm in arm now...inhaling the fumes
of our unspoken truce. reveling in the sanctity of our bond
without losing a thread in our poncho
to a snag in the deluge.... or raindrop teeth.
we continue in our way.
conjoined in our congenial orbits.
disrobed from the
inside-out.
two columns of mute serenity...
stalled where the bridge
and the railing; conspire to frame the stream below
with the moment of our pregnant
pause.
as seen from ground zero in a cataract
of awe and epiphany.
the mist from stones dashing about like trout
draping our skin in flecks of Indra and glass spider eyes
laughing at all our jokes, before the punchline
finds your Abbot
to Costello.
we are drenched in a thousand specks of mirror.
with tide pools in our crows'feet... and all
the continuum of glory...
the unvarnished fathoms of our symbiosis
and the dignity of our invulnerable
Haj to the Mecca of our Peace.
II
i was disconnected from your umbrella
as you never believed in -
having one.
so i embrace precipitation
with all the ****** delight
of a pagan in the company
of His oracle.
your antlers
shedding skin
and divine.
my spirit
dwelling
in a
jar
full of fireflies.
for true.
Sep 21, 2017
Sep 21, 2017 at 3:04 AM UTC
The church is still there
at the end
of the narrow road,
the high hedgerows
and the vicarage
remain pretty much
the same,
but you are not,
for you lie
in another place
of rest than this,
although I don't
know where.
The inside is as it was,
the choir stalls
where we sang
all those years ago,
are as they were
although seeming smaller,
the ***** is silent now,
but still where it was
when the semi-deaf
organist played back then.
I look around me
as I stand;
the same smell
old churches have,
coloured light
through the windows,
the lectern
where the vicar spoke
(sometimes too long),
and the wooden pews
where the aging
congregation sat
and listened
or fell asleep.
I walk around
the church outside
and pass old tombstones
aged by time,
cross the small
wooden bridge
where we once stood
and watched the water
pass below or kissed
in moonlight after choir
before the ride home.
I stand alone now
and you elsewhere,
cancer's hold took you down
your brother said,
that time he met me
in the town,
sometime after.
I hear birdsong
and wind in trees,
but not your laughter.
May 29, 2018
May 29, 2018 at 6:43 AM UTC
CONTINUING WITH THE SPIRIT OF CHRISTMAS
HERE IS THE STORY BEHIND THE ENGLISH HYMN:
“ONWARD CHRISTIAN SOLDIERS”
"Onward, Christian Soldiers" is a 19th-century English hymn. The words were written by Sabine Baring-Gould in 1865, and the music was composed by Arthur Sullivan in 1871. Sullivan named the tune "St Gertrude," after the wife of his friend Ernest Clay Ker Seymer, at whose country home he composed the tune. The Salvation Army adopted the hymn as its favoured processional. This piece became Sullivan's most popular hymn. The hymn's theme is taken from references in the New Testament to the Christian being a soldier for Christ, for example II Timothy 2:3 (KJV ) : "Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ."
Now Arthur Sullivan was the son of a military bandmaster, who composed his first anthem at the age of eight, and was later a soloist in the boys' choir of the Chapel Royal. ... To supplement the income from his concert works he wrote hymns, parlour ballads, and other light pieces, and worked as a church organist and music teacher.
LYRICS OF THE FAMOUS HYMN
“Onward, Christian soldiers, marching as to war,
With the cross of Jesus going on before.
Christ, the royal Master, leads against the foe;
Forward into battle see His banners go!
o Refrain:
Onward, Christian soldiers, marching as to war,
With the cross of Jesus going on before.
At the sign of triumph Satan’s host doth flee;
On then, Christian soldiers, on to victory!
Hell’s foundations quiver at the shout of praise;
Brothers, lift your voices, loud your anthems raise.
Like a mighty army moves the church of God;
Brothers, we are treading where the saints have trod.
We are not divided, all one body we,
One in hope and doctrine, one in charity.
Crowns and thrones may perish, kingdoms rise and wane,
But the church of Jesus constant will remain.
Gates of hell can never ’gainst that church prevail;
We have Christ’s own promise, and that cannot fail.
Onward then, ye people, join our happy throng,
Blend with ours your voices in the triumph song.
Glory, laud, and honor unto Christ the King,
This through countless ages men and angels sing.”
……Posted by Raj Nandy of New Delhi.……
Dec 16, 2020
Dec 16, 2020 at 10:45 PM UTC
It's life and not the Western Front
you don't get the sheriffs star
or go with Beau Geste on
a terrorist hunt
Daktari?
who mentioned that throwback
from the outback
way back
long ago?
If you wanted fireworks
you've got them
I've got a hyperactive thyroid
******* annoyed about it
but
****
it's small potatoes when compared to
this atom bomb we're siting on
Is it all quiet?
inyer
dreams.
Nov 5, 2017
Nov 5, 2017 at 1:53 PM UTC