"Abstraction" - Franciscan Poetry & Prose

Abstraction

Love is not a theory.

Love must be felt.

Proved in extremities of promise,

begotten, beyond understanding.

Love is not occasional.

Love must be eternal.

Fleshed in an innocent cry,

suddenly strong to conquer.

Love is not weak.

Love must be bold.

Gone forth in revealing stride,

filling faith with truth.

Love is not scared.

Love must be trust.

Stretched from side to side,

unbroken under obedience.

Love is not dead.

Love must arise.

Submerged in tearful wonders,

recreated by love.

– Fr. David Kaczmarek, T.O.R.

(© copyright All Rights Reserved Kaczmarek, David.)

"(W)hole" - Franciscan Poetry & Prose

(W)hole

(for S.G. and J.R. – dead from Crohn's disease)

I knew Stan and Jack but

But their lives were not

Filled in. They were half dug.

It's not right.

We are made to dig

And then fill in the hole

Complete to finish the chore.

That's how we come to know

Who we are. It's about emptying

And filling. Kenosi. Pleroma.

Via Negativa. And Via Positiva

And I'm not sure but they both

Got screwed when it came to emptying

Holes deeper than any body ever needed.

Bodies filled with scars, holes and tattoos

Of grief. Hard hues and dues. Pain's paint chips.

I miss them. And you know what scares me?

I'm still digging too and feeling closer to them both.

There's this hole deeper than I'll need.

And I'm tired of dirt in my shoes and neath my nails.

You know, it's hard to see God

From the ignorant end of a slit trench

Or a grave.

Yea, perhaps no saints in foxholes

But, then again, don't look for atheists

In sickbeds either

Father, forgive us, for our words are black and blue.

Father, forgive me, for a life in search of you.

– Bro. Didacus R. Wilson, T.O.R.

(© copyright All Rights Reserved Wilson, Richard S.)

"Presence" - Franciscan Poetry & Prose

Presence

You cannot see a breeze;

You can feel it slice your sun-reddened face,

And rise and fall, the siren of your ears,

And whirl the leaves,

And part the grass like Moses.

You cannot name a breeze;

It will not be owned or ever blocked,

Or kept from some dark corner,

Or tempted or repulsed,

Like a quantity of something made.

When I knew spirit, it was a breeze;

It did not cool or silence the din in my head;

It found me fearsome in my room

Where I was helpless and alone with my friends,

Casting shame into a parting flame.

I know the breeze now from the wind;

We rise and fall together, nameless and unseen,

But ever felt when absence haunts the world

And eyes start at the memory of love.

Our fire does not consume.

– Fr. David Kaczmarek, T.O.R.

(© copyright All Rights Reserved Kaczmarek, David.)

"Time On Its Side" - Franciscan Poetry & Prose

(Sculpture by Kenneth Treister at the Miami Holocaust Memorial.)

Time On Its Side

Hunger crawls in a crooked line,

Hunger stalks from here, to there, to nowhere.

Hunger speaks in small mouths of rice.

Hunger counts backwards like a patient anesthetized.

Hunger growls regardless of its leash.

Hunger is a straw-empty cage of lies.

The lens of its stare ready to ignite,

Hunger sprawls patiently in the sun.

Hunger knows its whims, is terminal.

Hunger never asks, "Am I my brother's keeper?"

Hunger is sloppy, skin-taut and navel protruded

like a series of ellipses.

Hunger breaks no bones.

Hunger, nothing less than a corpse's masque,

is visible, lonely,

Consecrated with flies that hover like dirt angels

Praying over their victims.

And here no lilies smolder at the edges,

Putting on airs---

Hunger waits with time on its side.

– by Bro. Didacus R. Wilson, T.O.R.

(© copyright All Rights Reserved Wilson, Richard S.)

"Weapons of Mass Creation" - Franciscan Poetry & Prose

Weapons of Mass Creation - A Sonnet (2003)

Colors mean nothing to those who cannot see

or feel because their hearts have lost the touch.

In lack we fail to find divinity,

we lie to say we cannot love much.

The Christ is in the billions of the world

in same degree and will not be denied;

the Christ of innocence has often cried,

and reigned as waves of warring were unfurled.

The thorns will prick with every orphan's cry,

the nails will pierce as nameless bombs destroy.

Their vic'try in control for some means joy,

if only Christ were not in those that die.

Our peace is in the billions of the earth

when Christ is seen and touched in ev'ry birth.

– by Fr. David Kaczmarek, T.O.R.

(© copyright All Rights Reserved Kaczmarek, David.)

"Field Work" - Franciscan Poetry & Prose

(Corn Field at St. Bernardine Monastery; Hollidaysburg, PA)

Field Work

(for Ambrose)

Let me resume

my words announcing a psalter

of tool, earth,

kingdom of the earthworm,

stake and furrow ...

where there is ground

that never goes fallow.

Let these hands

wake to the ways

dank, soft, leaf-rot,

the command of my fingers

darkening, waiting to tap

the trek of root, runner and vine.

In the pale half-light

where the air is alive

with ochre, russet,

and the assertion of stones,

let my body remember the pull

of this fair patch of soil,

the blister of the sun

touch by touch and how

my labor rests in tne hickory

handle of a hole as it

harnesses a deeper power.

When day's done

let sleep's secrets

nestle like seeds

in my cranial fields:

dreaming of laced ferns, molten

mosses, rusted dogwood and laurel.

Then let me rise

with pollen in the corner

of my eyes and the sun

blessing my branches forever.

– by Bro. Didacus R. Wilson, T.O.R.

(© copyright All Rights Reserved Wilson, Richard S.)

(Bro. Matthew, T.O.R. working in the field.)

"Alzheimers Magnificat" - Franciscan Poetry & Prose

Alzheimers Magnificat (2004)

My soul proclaims God's glory
                                                     Do you know my story?
My spirit exults the Lord
                                                     Can you hear my word?
Who favored a lowly servant
                                                      I'm lowly too, and bent.
                                                 ... and holy is the name of God.


All people will call me blest.
                                                    Where will I find rest?
God has done good for me;
                                                     I can only see darkly ...
God's mercy lasts forever.
                                                    Can you turn my page?
                                                ... and holy is the name of God.


God has shown a strong arm
                                                    Protect me from harm.
and has scattered the conceited;
                                                    Who has pride anymore?
God has pulled rulers from thrones
                                                    Why am I Alone?
and has lifted up the lowly.
                                                    I'm lowly too, and bent.
                                                ... and holy is the name of God.


God has filled the hungry,
                                                 Will you feed me?
but given the rich nothing.
                                                 Am I anything?
God has aided a servant,
                                                 What's my name?
in remembrance of God's mercy.
                                                 Do you remember me?
                                             ... and holy is the name of God.


– by Fr. David Kaczmarek, T.O.R.


(© copyright All Rights Reserved Kaczmarek, David.)

"Holy Ground" - Franciscan Poetry & Prose

Holy Ground

Grackles with eyes of halfed lopes

jabber along the loose coils of barbed wire.

Weeds grow to dizzy angles here

while I call out the friar's names:

Osbelt, Smyth, Hatch, McNammera.

Something calls from the scrub pines

that casts scented shadows from sun-stung

needles. The pine cones mime balmed secrets

that gather meaning from the wind.

At the priory across the road,

shades are pulled to the noon sun

and the refectory is filled with

the clutter sounds of spoons against bowls.

I stand here among these headstones

where the air is as still as a young possum's breath

and the field rocks doze in the drainage culvert,

their backs bleached and dry.

it is late.

The slow sanctus of the Angelus bell

Encircle our small lives.

Come Sit. Listen.

McNammera, Hatch, Smyth, Osbelt.

– by Bro. Didacus R. Wilson, T.O.R.

(© copyright All Rights Reserved Wilson, Richard S.)