Easter

I have never been in Jerusalem

but after years of teaching in the

Middle East, I have been pretty close.

I have never been on the road

to Damascus and seen a resurrected

Jesus, either, but relatively speaking

compared to most I’ve been in the area

and so been pretty close.

Once in Greece, I rode in an air conditioned

bus while a Bell Tour Guide pointed out

the cave where Socrates drank hemlock.

It wasn’t much to look at and if not similar

to the stone that was rolled away from

Jesus’s crypt, I bet it was pretty close.

My sister argues again and again that

the religious nut jobs are responsible

for all the wars and evil in this world.

Maybe.  But after seventy years of being

sorrowed and joyed by the human

entanglement of life, I’m not so sure.

Get me off in a private corner where

I know there’s no escape and ask me again.

Then, with the wild eyes of an old

Greek warrior going into battle to

kill or be killed, I might answer differently.  

Am I a religious nut job?  Probably not.

But I have a feeling that’s hard to deny

with all things considered that I probably

am getting pretty close.

FG           3/26/2016

The money donated by family and friends is in my bank in Wyoming.  It matches almost to the dollar what I spent for six days and five nights in Bangkok Hospital in Phitsanulok, Thailand.  I am at a loss for words to say thanks.  The Greeks called poetry the Master Art and in some small part I am going to think that your gift was a vote for poetry (even poetry that flat-out sucks).

I am home and feeling better, but feeling better and getting better with this hideous disease whatever it might be called, I know are two different things.

Christ the Lord has risen for sure.

Life is not a journey but an entanglement.