Month: November 2017

ALWAYS SOMETHING

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

1

a decrepit mess / pit

put them away

a cat, a dog, an auto executioner
gone, finally, by dawn

desperate houses plunked down in rock face
where will everyone live?

2

Warren Farm’s disastrous pick-your-own corn experiment
DeMerritt Hill Farm now owned by New York City refugees
who need to make the mortgage

while I’ve planted

blueberries, raspberries, asparagus, pussy willow,
rosa rugosa
the laurel and rhododendron that didn’t survive
all mine, all the same, within some inexplicable current

3

gentleness versus meanness
anger (I’m angry all the time)

RITUAL
versus
SURPRISE

Wild Willy’s still closed on Sundays

To continue, click here.
Copyright 2015

 

MORE THAN A COMMITTEE, ACTUALLY

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 1 Comment

Perhaps it will also help to keep in mind that the modern Ministry and Counsel committee reinvents the traditional select meeting of Ministers, Elders, and Overseers: those with recognized gifts in prophetic, free-gospel vocal ministry; in being bishops or anchorites, holding the meeting community in prayer; and in being pastoral caregivers, aware of temporal and spiritual needs and responding to them. At Agamenticus our biggest weakness is on the overseer front. In many pastoral congregations, I would argue, many problems arise because the pastor or minister is expected to embody all three functions, and the “priesthood of all believers” is subsequently lost. That’s a far cry from “releasing” the pastor to fulfill one gift, with the congregation performing the other roles as they, too, are gifted. In an unprogrammed meeting, this means being aware of the ways each person fits into the body of Christ.

I sense that it will be important for you to reach out beyond Orono Meeting, to find within Vasselboro Quarter and the Yearly Meeting the “secret Wilburites” who seem to exist in every meeting, but who often feel isolated; in my travels among Friends, they often come up to me after the hour of worship and express gratitude for hearing a Christ-centered, Bible-based message. One Friend observed that as she grew spiritually, she began to discover that everyone she considered a “Weighty Quake,” a Friend with depth and grounding, was also a devoted Christian. And the traditional Bible Half-Hour each morning at Yearly Meeting has contained some of the best spiritual study I’ve encountered anywhere, arising more “in” the text than “about” it.

~*~

For more Seasons of the Spirit, click here.

TURKEY TALK, TOO

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 4 Comments

The mind dances here and there, rarely in a linear progression. So what’s in my thoughts these days? How about counting on these fingers?

~*~

  1. While driving through town, I glance over at a small cemetery and notice wild turkeys padding about. A whole flock, actually, reminding me of hunting season hereabouts and the national holiday just ahead. Somehow, the critters know the calendar, and the wiser ones find sanctuary in town. Good luck to the rest of their brood.
  2. With the return of cold weather, we once again use our front entryway and the mudroom beside the kitchen as auxiliary refrigerators. Don’t trip over the pots and pans when you visit.
  3. When it comes to problems, focus on what’s closest, rather than always on the horizon. (The view from Mount Aquarius.)
  4. It’s all New Work, in the works.
  5. After all the lost or difficult years, the dashed dreams and desires, broken promises, upheavals – mingled, curiously, with gratitude. I’M HERE!
  6. What never happened – and then?
  7. Asked how long they’d lived there, in an American Walden, the artist replied: “Too long!”
  8. Could the text be made simpler, rather than wildly reaching?
  9. It’s better to know, even if it’s bad news, than to be left hanging in limbo
  10. We keep trying to find a good system for storing our leeks through the winter. We’re very open to suggestions.

~*~

A mid-afternoon view of the Cocheco River running through Dover carries a forewarning of winter.
A mid-afternoon view of the Cocheco River running through Dover carries a forewarning of winter.

STRAIGHT AND NARROW

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

there is much to admire in the unembellished line
when true

Squirrel, who would drive a crooked furrow
in a place where only the best horses
may be proud without sinning

has strayed much as a black bear past midnight
after the spring lambing

* * *

maybe he could have built a dairy herd
milked in a white-walled shed

given the right partner, who would not weep
over bank statements where the only green
would be choked with weeds

his life fenced in, a private Eden
stacked with moldy bales

to slip into rubber boots and shovel
his way back, behind him

* * *

but the scoutmaster was right
Squirrel’s not handy, that way

with wrenches or wiring
or even bent nails, much less

some ballgame or ice skates
no wonder the world was wide open

to the embroidery of his mind
when he had nothing to hold on to

these things shape one’s direction
as much as any opportunity

* * *

today’s American farmer
is a mechanic, electrician, carpenter,
accountant, designer before
the crops and herds matter

Poem copyright 2016 by Jnana Hodson
To see the full set of Home Maintenance poems, click here.

BUT THAT’S NOT EVERYTHING

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

in the median strip of Route 17 just north of Pennsylvania
Paula and I found a road map of Fayette County, Tennessee
“you wanna talk about getting lost?”

all these vehicles entering a busy traffic circle
are just a matter of shuffling cars . as the matron confided,
“Harry and I used to go down to Buffalo” to do this or do that

careening along curving roads, I saw the moon
swallowed and released over mountains . “she’s
a nice girl who does well in school, but that’s not everything”

or we could have just stopped at a
BAR DINING ROOM
flashing in orange and green neon

To continue, click here.
Copyright 2015

 

PLACES OF RETURN

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

Years later, a friend relates an incident of telling his wife his intention of spending the day in a favorite place in the mountains, countered by her question of what makes him return there. Even though he’s a photographer, he replies by acknowledging that many of his writer friends have answered the question simply, saying it’s the surprises that draw them back.

Somehow, as one of his writer friends, I find the word “surprise” in this context jarring. For surprises, one would be better served by trips to new locations, rather than returning to an old favorite. Novelty, rather than familiarity. Upheaval or intoxication, rather than purity or sobriety. Even so, as I consider my own places of return, her question becomes increasingly kaleidoscopic.

First, there’s the very demand of naming a favorite place. In this context, he invokes wilderness, where return is a kind of pilgrimage. Here, return may be once or twice a year, if that frequent. I could counter that with an evening stroll, as I used to do along the canal bank at the back of the desert orchard, or sitting at the café downtown in the small New England city where I now dwell — activities that could take place daily. We could add to that an opera house or concert hall, museum gallery, or even places of dedicated labor: a studio, cabinetry shop, garden, kitchen, or laboratory. Even, though rarely for me, shopping destinations: a boutique or farmers’ market, perchance. A fair or festival.

So the question soon turns to a matter of one’s intention. What is one attempting to escape or encounter? What is one leaving behind and what does one face instead?

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