Grow Mercy

If God Was My Neighbour

Posted on May 23, 2019 by stephen t berg / 9 Comments

Image: Mr. Wilson from Home Improvements

Sure, if God was my neighbour
I’d be outside mowing the lawn all day,
glancing over the fence on every pass
and at night tremble under the sheets.
How could you sleep?

And I’d think twice about calling the cops with a noise complaint.
It’s not, as I understand it, that God is incapable of whispering,
I’ve heard of that famous still small voice, but at times
the muttering coming from the kitchen can be thunderous.

Not to mention visitors at all hours, Abraham and his skittish son,
and all those sheep parked out on the street on days
hot and long as deserts.
Moses and Aaron drop by too often.
Esther and Ruth not nearly enough.
And those tedious twins and all the ill-bred brothers,
stop in just to bitch and brawl.
Solomon showed up the other day, high on his own flatulence.
Job came by once. You could have cut the tension with a khopesh.
And all the while a procession of major and minor prophets
trying to convince God to come out of retirement,
at least do a bit of volunteering.

But all God wants to do is reminisce
and tend that lone donkey in the front yard,
the one the son rode into Jerusalem through the Gate of Mercy,
patched cloaks and leafy branches of trees tossed across the road.
Oh what a magnificent guileless send-up that was!
Dovish king on an ass!
A big benign middle finger to every preposterous little Herod!
Such hope the day held, the city was moved by joy,
people danced, “Hosanna,” they shouted,
“Prince of Peace,” they shouted.

Thinking about it, God still chokes up,
while the burro, despite apples from God’s own hand,
grows old and weary watching the street
for a couple approaching disciples,
the words still clear in those donkey ears,
“The Lord has need of you.”

Environment/Kindness/Peace/War

We have all the wisdom we need

Posted on May 18, 2019 by stephen t berg / 5 Comments

We have all the wisdom we need
     to grant the concluding wish of some Miss Teen Ohio.
We don’t need another summit, conference, committee…
we only need to take a short walk to our own bookshelves,
     pick up, say, Ode to Common Things or The Prophet or The Pearl,
         to mould codes of understanding,
             sow kindness, root honesty, sprout peace.

Our research is a rouse.
The touted break-through will not come,
as all the evidence suggests
we don’t want it.

We prefer our malls filled, our money without memory,
our news laundered, our movies vengeful, our enemies evil,
our opponents villainized, our heroes utilized,
our mountains, rivers and oceans monetized.

It’s enough to cheer on that youngster from Sweden
as she travels the world, not using airlines or eating beef,
scolding leaders, whose brows appear appropriately furrowed,
as they walk, sufficiently burdened with concern,
to the lectern and teleprompter and state:
“See, this is our future, our great progressive culture has produced her,
so be reassured, everything is in hand.

“We only need another term, you’ll see how different
everything will look in four years.

“We only need one more coal mine, pipeline, frac-site,
wiretap, surveillance app, data dragnet,
missile defence system, arms deal, middle-east regime change,
after which we’ll have the security and capital
to fund emergency rooms, mental health clinics, hospitals, housing,
tackle heart disease, reduce military spending by a huge percentage
and go so green you won’t believe it.

“Listen, it’s like this: remember when the bald eagle was nearly extinct?
Now look how well they flourish by the land fills.

“We couldn’t be more serious.
In fact, one CEO, a personal friend, has vowed not to use
any of his swimming pools at any his vacation homes,
until everyone has drinking water,
or
at least until this business of who owns it is cleared up.

“And we’ll get those corporations to start paying their taxes too,
so we can invest in people,
because,
     dammit,
         that’s our greatest resource,
and our children, like young Greta here,
     God bless ‘em,
         they’re the future!”

Light/Spirituality

A selfish little thing I do

Posted on May 5, 2019 by stephen t berg / 18 Comments

A selfish little thing I do for the quiet anonymity, introspection and the beauty of the space: is attend Midweek Eucharist at St. Peter’s, Quamichan.

But on this day, while taking the sidewalk up to the church I see the priest, a short woman with cumulus-coloured hair, striding affably toward a young mother with her two children who are paused beside the stone bench on the path. I try for the nod-and-quick-pass but the priest catches me by the hand and I’m brought into the circle.

We learn that the mother and children are visiting from California, and the bench, with the delicate blue inlaid tiles, is a memorial to her mother. She has made a pilgrimage to show her children where their grandmother is buried; where she had been held, cared about and honoured by a small community.

The priest asks the mother, who is shy and appears ready to leave, if she’d like to attend the service: “No? well then would you like to see the inside of the church?” And while she hesitates the priest bends toward the children and asks if they’d like to ring the bell (and what child doesn’t want to ring a bell?). The mother’s slight protest evaporates and they enter the sanctuary while I make my little escape and go through the anteroom.

With seven or so greying others I take my seat in the chancel, pick up the Book of Common Prayer, then see the priest, in full effervescence, waving at me from the back of the nave; now she comes, almost loping, calling upon my help to reach the bell rope.

With my reluctance masked I leave my chair, walk the narrow aisle and stretch to catch the knot at the end of the rope. I feel the resistance — feel my own resistance to all the fuss — and hear the priest, “We must ring it together, and ring it three times!”

The girl is directed to hold my free hand, her brother to hold hers and the priest holds his while the mom looks on. I pull the rope, feel sound through sisal, hear the bell go out over Cowichan valley, see the light of smiles on the children and the priest and the mother, and like some lost bird awakening to a forgotten song in its throat, I ring and ring way past the allotted three.

Photos from St. Peter’s Quamichan and Duncan Sightseeing

Love/Mercy

When nothing else could help, Love lifted me

Posted on April 28, 2019 by stephen t berg / 6 Comments

It’s a beautiful feeling, although fleeting:
you walk upstairs into the open living room
and see a tongue of ocean between stands of hemlock
and further east the reclining hip, waist and shoulder
of an island, its aura glistening in the morning sun,
and every trace of anxiety, envy, fear, is gone.
And you want to call a friend, but its too early.
This lasts approximately halfway through your first coffee.
The rest of the day will be a write-off, of course,
your mind, like the head of an eel,
drawn this way and that,
by it’s fondness for the good life,
it’s unmatched ability to create little scenarios
where you’re out ahead of the pack
strolling through flowers cast from the margins onto your path.
Well, there’s no end to these picayune ego-fictions,
(Naturally this is not something I feel comfortable discussing,
but somehow I felt I could talk to you.)
nor the subsequent dunes of discontent.
But fortunately the earth rolls over and there is sleep;
sleep and the memory of morning, when, it was like, or it was,
God, in the guise of a bald eagle gloriously glided past your four windows
and a rush of self-forgetting love — yes, for every neighbour and stranger —
lifted you into the truth of an old hymn
and even parts of the Lord’s prayer were answered:
for you, rarely-repentant, frequent-flyer trespasser,
had been, as it were, invited in. And over tea:
“It’s simple really,” says Love, “what you desire, provide.”

The title of this poem is from Love Lifted Me – a hymn by James Rowe, 1912
The last line is a rephrase of a line by Franz Wright, from his poem, Entries Of The Cell, 2013