Showing posts with label Harriet Powers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Harriet Powers. Show all posts

Monday, December 22, 2014

Change in Menu

December 22

CHANGE IN MENU


If God is drunk we pray for spiritual sobriety and strong sponsorship.  If God is sober we ask for these things on God’s behalf and glory in answered prayer.  It is amazing that the rain comes down if I dance for it or not.  I can get this wonderful recovery just like the rest of ‘we agnostics’, I don’t have to shake your hand, wink my eye or say some special bit of poetry to have it.  Just the same way that weather is and changes and deepens so too is my spiritual condition.  It is there as I tread this path.  I don’t have to mark the rows in my garden for the plants to grow.  I wish for God a salad with two forks, we no longer need to share a bottle.

Dance with your skeletons.

*

Harriet Powers


Like a creature with a long tale
told in a hushed voice.
The whispers tell the story
with inflection and innuendo.

I slink away from the mirror
and the disembodied voices it engenders.
Thirty versions of my past spin away from me
in the eddies of time gone and misremembered.

I gather my fragments and tatters;
I thread my needle
and sit to quilt me into the present.

The odd assortment left from all which has worn out
or been pulled apart fit in a pinwheel pattern
and turn toward a better day.

The night is warmer for now I have it covered,
settled and safe, perhaps now I might even sleep.


You are reading selections from Sober on the Way to Sane and More Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

Friday, December 27, 2013

Harriet Powers

December 27


Harriet Powers

Like a creature with a long tale told in a hushed voice.  The whispers tell the story with inflection and innuendo.  I slink away from the mirror and the disembodied voices it engenders.  Thirty versions of my past spin away from me in the eddies of time gone and misremembered.  I gather my fragments and tatters; I thread my needle and sit to quilt me into the present.  The odd assortment left from all which has worn out or been pulled apart fit in a pinwheel pattern and turn toward a better day.  The night is warmer for now I have it covered, settled and safe, perhaps now I might even sleep.


Use a crutch if you have to but move
*


Best so Far

Being the best so far doesn’t mean so awful much
Makes you the current standard bearer is all
Not even keeper of the watch.

I can’t give you a torch to hold
Certainly not a title either of Daddy or of Din
You will find your way through this morass
Keep your courage if not your cast
But this is a hard thing my dear, dear friend
Because the old tricks they don’t work no more
And the new tools ain’t broke in.

And lest I should forget
Just because you say you have a sense of humor about yourself
Doesn’t mean you have it
And when you try to take me to hand
It doesn’t mean you ken it
And all the days that dreams drift by
It doesn’t mean they’re yours and mine

For time must play its evil trick
And leave good things to pass by us
But this doesn’t mean that hope is lost
Or even that I’ve found it
Only that peace is a thing which seeps
And pressing will confound it

So maybe when you are pushing seventy
And are sober nearly as I am now
I will read this to you
And we will laugh
For by then being the best so far
Will matter a little more and hurt a little less.


You are reading selections from More Sober on the Way to Sane and Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

Saturday, December 22, 2012

Change in Menu


December 22

CHANGE IN MENU



If God is drunk we pray for spiritual sobriety and strong sponsorship.  If God is sober we ask for these things on God’s behalf and glory in answered prayer.  It is amazing that the rain comes down if I dance for it or not.  I can get this wonderful recovery just like the rest of ‘we agnostics’, I don’t have to shake your hand, wink my eye or say some special bit of poetry to have it.  Just the same way that weather is and changes and deepens so too is my spiritual condition.  It is there as I tread this path.  I don’t have to mark the rows in my garden for the plants to grow.  I wish for God a salad with two forks, we no longer need to share a bottle.

Dance with your skeletons.

*

Harriet Powers


Like a creature with a long tale
told in a hushed voice.
The whispers tell the story
with inflection and innuendo.

I slink away from the mirror
and the disembodied voices it engenders.
Thirty versions of my past spin away from me
in the eddies of time gone and misremembered.

I gather my fragments and tatters;
I thread my needle
and sit to quilt me into the present.

The odd assortment left from all which has worn out
or been pulled apart fit in a pinwheel pattern
and turn toward a better day.

The night is warmer for now I have it covered,
settled and safe, perhaps now I might even sleep.


Monday, December 27, 2010

Harriet Powers

December 27

Harriet Powers

Like a creature with a long tale told in a hushed voice. The whispers tell the story with inflection and innuendo. I slink away from the mirror and the disembodied voices it engenders. Thirty versions of my past spin away from me in the eddies of time gone and misremembered. I gather my fragments and tatters; I thread my needle and sit to quilt me into the present. The odd assortment left from all which has worn out or been pulled apart fit in a pinwheel pattern and turn toward a better day. The night is warmer for now I have it covered, settled and safe, perhaps now I might even sleep.

Use a crutch if you have to but move

*

Best so Far

Being the best so far doesn’t mean so awful much

Makes you the current standard bearer is all

Not even keeper of the watch.

I can’t give you a torch to hold

Certainly not a title either of Daddy or of Din

You will find your way through this morass

Keep your courage if not your cast

But this is a hard thing my dear, dear friend

Because the old tricks they don’t work no more

And the new tools ain’t broke in.

And lest I should forget

Just because you say you have a sense of humor about yourself

Doesn’t mean you have it

And when you try to take me to hand

It doesn’t mean you ken it

And all the days that dreams drift by

It doesn’t mean they’re yours and mine

For time must play its evil trick

And leave good things to pass by us

But this doesn’t mean that hope is lost

Or even that I’ve found it

Only that peace is a thing which seeps

And pressing will confound it

So maybe when you are pushing seventy

And are sober nearly as I am now

I will read this to you

And we will laugh

For by then being the best so far

Will matter a little more and hurt a little less.