The Fshbwl

I left a book on aging
in a room I frequent—
I left an age of booking
in a gloom I rent.
I’ve said goodbye to friends and pastures,
I’ve got new eyes for blends and fixtures.
Colors, colors,
death and life,
hold the hand of glory’s crash.
Crosses and blood are pouring—
on the walls of poor men hanging
by statue, stitch, or mooring.
Load-bearing walls of the soul are changing.
Give me a book, lend me an age,
still I wonder, still I pray:
Colors, colors
light the way.
Help me help them meet our Lord!

An Author's Reflection:
This poem could also be called, “While Sitting in the Break Room for Nursing Home Staff.” I am a volunteer chaplain at a nursing home and a Christian who has met many new “friends” of late; and, not unimportantly, takes seriously the words of 1 Corinthians 1:18: For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.

By contrast, there is the theological system of “glory” by which each of us, in our heart of hearts, tries to construct a way to explain life’s hurt, pain, and loss. Glory is a system of theology that says: “Whatcha got is what you deserved.” or “If you’d had enough faith, God would’ve taken away the pain.” But he never promised that. The need for the cross of Jesus and for his bloody death presupposes the brutish fact that we once had a stark need for salvation. It means that, against our protestations, God permits pain in this life in order to grow our souls in “character, endurance, and hope” (Romans 5:1-5). This, among other things such as “load-bearing walls of the soul,” is the subject of the poem. The poem, I hope, invites honesty about your own burning, existential questions. Yet “this hope” of Romans 5, this hope of the Lord, “will not disappoint us.”

The colors referred to are therefore the liturgical colors of an orthodox congregation as it remembers and celebrates the person and work of Jesus, the Son of God. “Orthodox” is a vilified word of late; it only means “straight praise.” How shall we praise the Lord? The Lord, who requires us to seek justice and love mercy? These are important questions! What shall we bring before the Lord, the very Maker of heaven and earth?

In short: our helplessness, our faith, our shriveling, outstretched hands; our aging and dying selves; our entire modern age and character, aching for “book answers” to save us (“give me a book, lend me an age”—read “amazon dot com”); essentially, all our doubts and fears codified in our muddling, wobbly personage. Holy prayers and holy offerings. Expectation. A waiting for the Lord. Amen!