Sonnet

O let the nations be glad and sing for joy.
For thou shalt judge the people righteously.
We need never about our faith be coy.
Nor we ever tried a path over piously.

Psalm 67 is the prayer that we say every day.
Beautiful in its soaring rhetoric.
It ushers in the new parliamentary day.
And is more inspiring than the usual rhetoric.

I opened it by chance today.
It brought back memories, sitting alone in our village church.
In this much quieter place our fears in its verse we can lay.
And help us in our life’s search.

As we say, God be merciful upon us and bless us.
And cause his face to shine upon us.

Haiku

God be merciful
And bless us and cause his face
To shine upon us

Not one dot will disappear from law.
Until it’s purpose is achieved.
I just wonder if this is my life’s core.
I have given less than I have received.

I have so often failed in the least.
Will then I be the least.
I forget so often the high priest.
Not to mention sometimes his feast.

So many commandments infringed.
So much wrong teaching.
My efforts at the edge, fringed.
Not to mention useless preaching.

Oh well let’s hope I be shown mercy.
Despite every controversy.

Haiku

The teaching is hard
But certainly it is right
How to follow it?

Sonnet

If salt becomes tasteless.
Who can make it salty again.
How long lasting is our faithfulness.
To live we must die like the grain.

We will never be saints, who can say.
Perhaps one small act of kindness.
Is all we can manage every day.
This is not a game of fitness.

Our light will not brightly shine.
It is well under the table, despite our talk.
We will not be first at the finishing line.
But we will have walked hesitantly the walk.

We come in with the seas restless tide.
And we leave without trace despite our pride.

Haiku

We come with the tide
Too soon we leave with the tide
And tides ignore us

Sonnet

Taste and see that the Lord is good.
The humble will hear and be glad.
My sight was covered as by a hood.
My time night thoughts were sad.

The doubts were drearily swirling.
How could a faith healer build stars.
But in my dream I saw this flowing.
Into a place as dead as Mars.

And belief was an ever wider stream.
Full of art and music and exploration.
This was now a joyful dream.
Of full bloodied happy sensation.

And so I greeted another day.
And thus I keep depression at bay.

Haiku

Can God create stars
Surely this isn’t possible
But alternative?

Sonnet

O God who in this Sacrament.
Has left a memorial of your passion.
Let us us now then never lament.
Because we are in His possession.

When the communion’s bell rolls.
We can believe it His Body and Blood.
But do not look into others’ souls.
It is for each to take it on the flood.

But what a wonderful moment.
To think He is actually here.
Truly nothing then to lament.
No need to ever shed a tear.

I wish I could absolutely believe this.
Or is there something that I miss.

Haiku

Is His Body here
It is for you to decide
And your conscience

Sonnet

They had put in the money left over.
But she put in all the money she had.
We don’t know if we are in clover.
We don’t know why we are sad.

Why is it we can’t be more generous.
Why don’t we give more to the poor.
Do we think it weak or dangerous.
Can we salute giving’s grandeur.

The world is rent with poor and rich.
We the rich will not give enough.
Between lies a vast ditch.
Half the world deprived of foodstuff.

I say this and do nothing.
I am worse than nothing.

Haiku

We give left overs
Others gave up all they have
Can we not do more

Sonnet

I can see my son.
The light of my eyes.
It does always sink, the sun.
Soon it will be dark, it sighs.

It is the depth of the night.
That comes the worst depression.
Nothing at all then is right.
Then everything is open to question.

But the sun will rise.
And morning will come.
Death will come and we will arise.
Speech will return to the dumb.

Love can be companionably silent.
All can be contained in the moment.

Haiku

Sight will still return
The blind will see again soon
But maybe not here

Sonnet

He drew up a marriage contract.
According to the law of Moses.
In marriage there is no certain fact.
Everything can get up our noses.

The only rule is compassion.
For those married and divorced.
All have a place in his mansion.
Nothing should be forced.

Communion should be for everyone.
Whatever their history or sexuality.
No one should have to be alone.
Love is the only reality.

Let us worry less about law.
And more about holding God in awe.

Haiku

Don’t worry with laws
Love everyone the same
Give the same to all

Sonnet

I desire to be delivered from earth.
And to become earth again.
Sometimes all is dearth.
All is marked with stain.

Why do I always see the negative.
My first thought on awakening.
Why cannot I be happy that I live.
Need I concern myself with the reckoning.

Let me see beauty in everything.
The day is cloudy, the sea green.
The shadows lengthen, old age‘s bell does ring.
I cannot grasp what it does mean.

But light shines through.
And calls to me too, all is true.

Haiku

The day does shorten
And mine too will come to end
But that is just fate

Sonnet

What about your own alms.
What about your good works.
We dwell on our own qualms.
But we should not worry about setting off fireworks.

We obsess about daily problems, mere passing breath.
But what of real end of life struggles and the last descent.
We will all confront pain, frailty and death.
Can we not enjoy the inadequate present.

Tobit was blinded.
By mere inadvertence.
But he doesn’t seem to have minded.
He knew what was of true importance.

May I be like the calm sea.
And learn just to be.

Haiku

Learn to be as the
Calm and blue sea far below
Still always moving

Sonnet

My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord.
And my spirit exults in God my saviour.
Love is never lost only stored.
It is encompassed all about with grandeur.

I gazed upon the sea today.
It visits but never stays.
Ever changing blue, green, and grey.
Hiding its heart in distant gaze.

I feel it’s movement within me.
The moment it visits my heart.
It is the remorseless sea.
Engraved and remembered on the mind’s chart.

Even away I feel it’s presence.
Invading, soothing every sense.

Haiku

In every visit
A memory is yet stored
Like the sea it stays

Sonnet

Was there ever a word so majestic.
From one end of heaven to the other.
The Cathedral organ rang out in sounds mystic.
Looking at the great cross here was my brother.

I was dreaming I was involved in some spat.
I looked at the postcard picked up from the floor.
It was St Joseph looking at a cat.
His gentle gaze struck me to the core.

I am in my small London back yard.
A robin is going cheerfully about her business.
Endlessly moving, always on guard.
Yet at peace despite her fussy ness.

Three separate occasions.
Yet one message of hope filled lessons.

Haiku

Three occasions
Can still contain one message
Three then works in one

Sonnet

From her blossoming to the ripening of her grape.
My heart has taken delight in her.
Wisdom and nature shelter us under her cape.
The everlasting search is the spur.

At midnight in the garden all was still.
There was not a breath of wind.
There was not an ounce of chill.
With nature I was gently twinned.

So motionless I could be framed.
In some picture of the countryside.
All desires to free this moment tamed.
Gone all regret and pride.

But why do I need nature to stir me.
Can I not use my mind alone to keep me free.

Haiku

Does nature stir us
Can we not use just our mind
It does not matter

Sonnet

Some have left no memory.
And disappeared as though they had not existed.
Hamilton Hill is a place to tarry.
In memory men of faith executed.

I fear the grim reaper’s might.
But death is merely a dark tunnel.
You come into it from hazy light.
You emerge from it into eternity’s bright channel.

At the entrance is pain and fear.
In the middle it is utterly dark.
Then you see a speck of light as you shed a last tear.
You emerge where no one cares if you have left a mark.

So I promise I will not fear my passing.
Then I forget and again start worrying.

Haiku

Death is a tunnel
Light at the start and at end
Black in the middle

Sonnet

Deep within them.
I will plant my law.
Way within the deep we find a gem.
In the darkness deep I saw.

Watch the film My Octopus Teacher.
Here is a new light on this creature.
They can be our preacher.
And point to a sympathetic future.

More intelligent than we knew.
Even capable of physical contact.
In strangeness find something new.
Wisdom can come from a new fact.

I swim deep into the dark lake.
Protect the wild for pity’s sake.

Haiku

Swim in the deep lake
Protect wild all around us
It can teach us too

Sonnet

They were in a daze.
And those that followed were apprehensive.
We will all find our way through life’s maze.
As St Philip says, try being prayerfully festive.

I had had a difficult talk about relationships.
Then I swam pass the coot making her nest of wood.
Her mate was calmly helping with sticks, mud and snips.
Both were doing all they could.

Here was no argument.
No dispute about what needs to be done.
Just get on with the job, don’t resent.
The birds seemed to have lots of fun.

There is no need for sadness.
Only joy and hopefulness.

Haiku

The bird makes her nest
Helped by her mate in all things
No resentment here

Sonnet

O God who bring light
To your church.
Help us to see what is right.
Aid us in our never ending search.

I was dreaming about St Joseph in my prayer
And in my dream I saw a golden light.
He seemed to envelop me in care.
Telling me all was held in his sight.

Will we approach our end.
As serenely as the Bede.
Our few possessions happy to lend.
Our life’s work our seed.

I pray for his equanimity.
Knowing it will not outlive all extremity.

Haiku

I saw in prayer
A white and golden lightness
Enveloping me

Sonnet

Near the cross stood His mother.
And His mother’s sister.
Was she praying desperately to His Father.
As we now pray to the universal mother.

I was day dreaming about money in Mass.
Then the words of the Gospel.
Came through the the mind’s dark glass.
About the necessity of all to sell.

I pray that I may not want for myself.
That I may want for my children what they want.
That I may worry more about the other than the self.
That I may accept that I often just can’t.

But then after this prayer for what you want.
I just start repeating to myself what I want.

Haiku

Pray for what she wants
Rather than for what you want
Then keep repeating

Sonnet

They were all filled with the Holy Spirit.
And began to speak foreign languages.
A fire exists in us despite our lack of merit.
It uplifts the restful soul and quells rages.

But we cower in our own room.
A room of the lonely mind.
Taking solace in an occasional zoom.
But we only have to learn to be kind.

The message is there for all nations.
Despite every human created division.
If only we could all make peace oblations.
This is ours and only our decision.

I know what is the answer in holy writ.
I just find it Oh so hard to do it.

Haiku

There is a fire there
It is for all of mankind
We have to say yes

Sonnet

The Lord is in in His holy temple.
His eyes look down on the world.
Nature is more and stirringly ample.
Winters cold and wet sails are furled.

The Laburnum burns bright yellow.
The lilac spreads her purple haze.
Beneath the blooming apple bud all is mellow.
The lavender casts her many branched gaze.

It is May in the garden growing.
The tulips and daffodils are now sleeping.
But everything else is surging.
Primrose and bluebell are flowering.

But I am waiting for the Rose in her glory.
To tell Summer’s story.

Haiku

God is in nature
His word springs forth the lilac
And closes winter

Sonnet

They had some argument about a dead man.
Whom Paul alleged was alive.
Strange how these arguments fan.
From generation to generation hard as we strive.

What Festus the Roman judge.
Could not understand.
And could only misjudge.
Neither can we in our an age and land.

It is this dead preacher.
And whether He is still around.
Who is the question, He is yes, the teacher.
But is He our entire surround.

Festus just got rid of the problem and flit.
I think we should confront it.

Haiku

Is this dead man here
That is central question
To everything

Sonnet

That they may be one as we are one.
With me in them and you in me.
I wonder if we are not all one.
Father, you and me.

Are we not all one.
If we believe in the Father.
And in the son.
And in each other.

Are we not ourselves.
But a bit of everyone else.
In loving them we love ourselves.
And they love us and all else.

I pray that this I see.
I am them and they are me.

Haiku

I am truly them
And they are also me too
Then I can love them

Sonnet

Paul says I have never asked anyone for money or clothes.
The work I did earned enough to meet my needs.
He expresses himself in flawless prose.
But far greater are his deeds.

What does he say, exert yourselves to support the weak.
There is more happiness in giving than receiving.
But easier than doing good is to it speak.
Having comes easier than giving.

I am watching ‘Nomadland’.
Sometimes happiness comes with having less.
I wonder why we care so little in our own land.
Our own possessions bring only stress.

It’s enough to say, see you down the road.
Than worrying too much about our own abode.

Haiku

It’s enough to say
See you down the road than care
About our own home

Sonnet

Provided that I finish my race.
I have carried out the mission.
We may leave through the water little trace.
And it’s almost over our session.

A white sun sinks into the ocean.
The sky runs with yellow, orange, and blue.
We are towed gently to our berth, all done with emotion.
Our fighting days are finished, all retired the crew.

Our only value that of scrap.
Once we sailed beautifully on our own, now propelled by a dream.
We have completed our last lap.
Gently flows past us, life’s stream.

But trials and sorrows are nearly done despite any merit.
We are only soon to be a prisoner to mere spirit.

Haiku

We are prisoner
Only to mere spirit now
Our days are over

Sonnet

O give thanks to the Lord for He is good.
And his mercy endureth for ever.
The village church has no holy rood.
But the great tree through the window is restful mental food.

How I wondered could a Palestinian faith healer create a billion stars.
But where is the joy of aetheism.
It’s as if in the whole universe we see no further than Mars.
Asking where in atheism is the beauty of scripture is no truism.

It’s as if it poses one answer.
And then stops uninspired.
It’s as if it has one step, this dancer.
It can only play one card.

I started the day with calm meditation in a tiny church.
I ended this day with glorious evensong in Christ Church.

Haiku

Give thanks to the Lord
Love endureth for ever
For yes He is good