Hail Mary

Heaven Harsh

The blood waters at sunrise

when the Universe cuts Earth’s cord.

The gory birth of each day

reflects back on the same seas

that mothered all land.

We don't see the difference

between Stone and Bone

after 10,000 years.

Time makes the extreme tones

of heartaches and heart-fulls

equally, equatorially weird.

Heaviness is a harshness

of Heaven by necessity.

All births are messy,

but some are a real Hail Mary.

If you give me a minute,

a tiny strand of time,

I will look for you in it.

The dawn of friendship

is only

a haven of moments

when we,

you and I,

mean something in the flood.

The right wave

is a long pass,

but even if you catch it,

every offensive play,

there is no such thing as a touchdown.

What goes up only comes around

in our harsh Heaven’s heaviness.

If I give you a minute,

a bare fray of rope,

I can only hope

you'll find me in it.

Irrespective of tides,

we could rise and pearl,

flash,

then curl,

a crashing wave,

feeling the heavy birthing pull

of Heaven’s sweetest harshness,

light, and inevitable,

as a baby's breath.

All births are messy,

but love is the real Hail Mary.

Blood waters when the Universe cuts Earth's cord, reflected on the seas that mothered all land. 

Baggage Wall

Build your walls of baggage.

Try to keep me at bay 

but still

secretly hoping 

I'll save your day.

There isn't enough drama 

in your closet 

to fence out my heart, 

not enough skeleton clubs 

to cleave us apart.

Stack up your baggage, Baby.

That wall will make great fuel

for the flame we're gonna burn.

Bring me all the hopes 

you thought you'd have to urn.

Stack up all the things

you thought better left

in the dark,

because we're still

gonna make a great embark.

I'm your two by two,

and this is our story's arc.

We're plenty slick enough 

to slip these customs agents. 

Our good intentions 

are sly enough to slide those gates.

We can afford the waits.

Stack up you baggage, Baby.

It won't wall off our world.

In or out,

I want to know what you're all about.

We'll establish an ancient trade route.

Go ahead,

stack up your baggage, Baby.

Throw in the kitchen sink.

I've got a torch and a wink.

This is how we step 

                            over the brink.

Cat's have no boundaries. They're good at love like that.

Things we've lost

We've lost

Another sunset lost.

all kinds
of things...

Your keys,
in another state.
My ring,
in another country.
Our way home
at night
and once,
in broad day light.
But never
one another.

Our tempers,
in another fight.
Our patience,
in another minute.
Lots of sight
of the whole
point.
But never
our love.

My will power.
Your courage.
Our fortitude
in a storm
of grief.
Our place
among the flames
of too many
disasters.
But never
our hope.

Plenty of time.
Yesterday,
and occasionally,
even tomorrow.
Maybe some
memories.
But never
today,
this chance,
to find
ourselves
together,
again.

We've lost
far fewer
things
than
we've gained.

The Slow Road Home

Mother's Day weekend. The traffic on Interstate 10 between Seguin and Houston was snarled. Bullishly stop and go and puke provoking. I realized there was probably little to to lose in taking the longer meandering old Highway 90 route home--maybe I could see something besides the angry red break-lights of dozens of Ford F-150s and bored passengers boring away at smartphone screens.

A few turns later and there was an expanse of open black-top divided by two golden lines stretching onward under towering green Oaks, Cedar Elms, and Caddo Pecan trees. In the gaps between foliage, the Colorado River glinted silver and gold in the afternoon sunlight. I rolled down my window and the wind rushed in full of the smell of earth and river, resounding with the lazy chirps of crickets and the lonely hum of my tires on the road.

I could feel the size of the smile on my tired face becoming nearly painful. Taking another chance, I turned on the AM radio rather than the XM satellite and from some station near the end of the dial came Woody Herman's swinging 1945 hit, "The Good Earth."

Nostalgia hit like a hammer. 

On just this kind of day in October of 1945, my grandparents took a similar drive along another part of the Colorado River from Bartlett to the county courthouse in Llano, Texas on State Highway 29. 

My grandpa used to tell me that story. He was 36 years old, a divorcee in 1945. His first spouse had wandered away somewhere between the Great Depression and World War II just like my grandma's. They were lucky to find one another, and driving to the Justice of the Peace that day to be married felt like freedom to him. His 1937 Chevy with the mohair interior didn't have a radio and maxed out around 85 horsepower. 

No air-conditioning or heating. 

Their windows would have been rolled down too.

They've both been dead for over a dozen years now, and yet, there they were riding along with me in the sunshine on the slow road home--laughing and contradicting one another. 

"The drive was long. Cars went slower then and the roads were smaller. There was no honey-moon." Grandma shaking her head.

Grandpa looking skeptical. "Yes, there was. There was the drive home. Don't you remember stopping to see the damn and Inks Lake?"

"If I did, then I don't now." Grandma's eyes full of mirth as she fixes him a loving glance.

I'm so glad I took the slow road home. I have missed them.

Parts of the old Spanish trail that eventually turned into one of the first transcontinental highways (Highway 90) and then Interstate 10 are still visible in their 1921 era glory.

My grandfather as young man on the road.

My grandmother, sometimes a reluctant traveler.

My grandparents' 25th wedding anniversary.

Pride and Prejudice

I tried to stifle my tear before it hit my waffle. I stared down at the text from my mother, "Supreme court recognized same-sex marriages. Heart. Smiley Face."
My wife was alarmed at my sudden change of affect, but I was too choked up to vocalize an explanation so I settled for passing the phone across the table.
Our eyes met.
I'd like to say unfettered joy crossed our faces and that we stood up and did a dance, but our prejudices ruined the moment.
We thought about holding hands but didn't.
We dashed the palms of our hands at the tears in our eyes while cautiously peering around us hoping no one would notice our odd behavior and ask if we were okay.  We might be prejudiced and even occasionally hypocritical, but we're also both horrible liars and we know it.  Don't ask after our welfare unless you want an honest answer, and on that day we were afraid (because of our prejudices) that an honest answer might get us lynched.
We were having breakfast at a Waffle House in Fayetteville, Arkansas on our way to a lakeside cabin near Eureka Springs.  I knew Eureka Springs was relatively hippy and LGBT tolerant, but we weren't there yet.
My wife bit her lip and gave me a smile.
She handed me back my phone and squeezed my fingers as our hands touched in the passing.
Our smiles trembled.  This was just too big to celebrate silently.I come from a long line (156 years back on the newly immigrated side of the family) of Texans.  My wife comes from an even longer line of Texans.  Parts of both of our families have been in American since 1690.  In short, we live in our ancestors' ancestors' homeland; and neither of us was about to abandon our families and careers to move out of state any time soon--even if that was the only way to obtain legal recognition of our relationship (our status as a family).

Sudden legal recognition of us as a family was momentous. Not because we or our family needed it to validate our relationship.  In our eyes, and the eyes of our friends and family, we had already been married for over three years.  We already had the illegal ceremony and marginally legal (as long as we don't talk about the city ordinances we broke) wedding reception. We had even already obtained a legal marriage certificate from Martin Luther King County in Seattle, Washington while we were passing through for work (and where more friends than we knew we had in town showed up uninvited to the impromptu ceremony to celebrate it with us).
Legal recognition of our marriage in Texas was momentous for us because it restored our faith in our homeland.
We were suddenly free to chase our dreams, buy a house, officially take care of each others' aging parents, and pay our taxes...as a couple (which meant paying more taxes by the way) in our ancestral homeland. We could have some of the same freedoms that our great, great, great grandparents came to these lands hoping to find and secure for their progeny.
Somehow it made me feel safer at home again.
But it didn't make me feel safer about expressing my love and happiness in a Waffle House in Fayetteville, Arkansas.
Of course, I have an excuse for that.  My prejudice prevented it.
That morning when we wandered into the Waffle House, we were greeted by a spirited, balding Caucasian septuagenarian named Joe, who proclaimed himself to be a lay minister and witness to Jesus, "Blessing upon us and all strays."
As I said, I'm from Texas, and I'm no stranger to adamant fundamentalist Christians.  I wasn't offended by Joe's strong expression of faith.  I blessed him back and we chatted about his life and then shared points of our faith for several minutes after he showed us to our table.
But I didn't give Joe the benefit of the doubt.  I let my stereotype of adamant fundamentalist Christians convince me that Joe would be rabidly opposed to same-sex marriage as a sin and that he would want to tell me all about how I was bound for hell rather than share our joy.  And I let this prejudice convince me that everyone in that Waffle House would share this condemning attitude.
Fortunately, my tears did hit my waffle, and Joe did notice.
He bustled his way back to our table, slid into the booth next to me, and asked the dreaded question, "Are you okay?"  In my hesitation, he continued, "I'll pray right with you, whatever it is."
I thought he would find my answer nutty and offensive, but I had to be true.  I told him we were just happy.  Happy that our marriage of three years was finally legal everywhere in our great country.
Joe was so happy that he cried too.  Then he thanked God for us with enough volume, enthusiasm, and specificity for everyone to hear and understand. . . and people clapped. Then he sang a celebratory hymn and people joined in, including me. I am ashamed that I did not sing with more courage with Joe in that Waffle House.  I should have suspected better of Joe in Fayetteville.

I am sad that I didn't realize until after we left breakfast that the Waffle House was on MLK street--I should have probably taken that as a sign from the universe.  Joe and God wanted us to be proud of our love and to share the joy and light that love brings without fear born of prejudices.  I should have already known that.

I am proud to know, and call family, so many compassionate and supportive people of a great diversity of religions, politics, ethnicities, educations, sexual orientations, and socio-economic classes. I believe this is America's greatness: that we can all so easily choose to know and love a great diversity of people.
And one lesson I have learned from my fortunate existence in this greatness is that most people prize and share two primary objectives: to love and be loved.  I strive to let this lesson always be my first prejudice now.

Our wedding bouquets. Photo by Andrew Fritz.