soupablog

stations of the cross

two of my stations of the cross from last year.
i miss that harmony guitar.
photographed by reallivepreacher

Station 10: Jesus is Crucified (detail on right)

Station 14: Jesus is Laid in the Tomb (detail on right)

i'm available by commission to finish the other twelve.

a poem for sunday

Friend, when I am dead,
Make a cup of the clay I become,
And if you remember, drink from it.
Should your lips cling to the cup,
It will be but my earthly kiss.                

-Traditional Mexican folk song




clay bowl, amy soupiset

as we get older

w e d n e s d a y,  11:50 pm

tonight my co-worker
is saying goodbye
to his dying grandmother

tonight two of our friends
severed fledgling ties,
and went their own ways;

tonight i had a talk with a
seventy-nine year old man
in an otherwise empty church;

tonight i spent two hours
with cows and a barking dog
and ants and a rocky path

tonight my eyes and ears
saw and heard beauty on film
as ryan and holly and daley played;

today i met with a man with
thrice my athletic ability:
a paralympic star

tonight i prayed for a woman
who might have cancer;
we've never met

today i drank italian soda
with cherry syrup
at lunchtime

tonight i fielded questions
from a friend with
computer problems

tonight i answered five
questions while kissing
jordan good-night

tonight we showered
together
and talked

hey amy,

as we get older
before our eyesight fails us
let us make a pact
to glance upon each other's faces
from time to time
and to invite the memory
to sear

and to remember love
and to prefer one another
and to remember how fragile
it all really is.

..... t h u r s d a y,  12:04 am

(Post)Lentenblog 2008 :: Labyrinth 14

labyrinth site as of 5:55pm 041608, shot from the west

the hour growing late,
pregnant
with this project, with possibilities,
i lifted the front edge of my
tee-shirt to form a chalky cloth sling

i piled in hands full of
fist-sized limestone
three, nine, thirty-eight,
and i labored to stand,
grabbing my back,
looking and feeling
like a last-trimester mama -
and i laughed out loud.
this father of four births,
four umbilical incisions,
four afterbirths,
and one miscarriage,
waddling over to this
birthing site,
pacing in artistic anticipation,
wondering and worrying
about this strange,
forthcoming delivery

so many strong women
in my life,
many of them mothers,
and some of them
wing-waiting

i figured they'd all
laugh out loud
(perhaps my twin-bearing
mom the loudest)
to see me wrestle and
wrangle and huff

i came around
to where i'd left off

i couldn't gracefully
set my quarry upon the earth
so i squatted
and, valsalva,
let the stones

fall

a little lower than the angels

had the earth tonight been water
the concentric rippled labyrinth
might have serv'd witness enough

to the father son and holy ghost.

prs 041608

labyrinth site as of 8:20pm 041608, shot from the east

labyrinth, texas style

i couldn't help myself: i started forming the switchbacks.

meaning heavy stone, tungsten.

unpoetry

so i am composing this post in the guadalupe coffee co. -- you've heard me blog about the place before. i worked up my courage to come down here and participate in a poetry open mic night. but the host canceled y no hay poesia este noche. entonces, voy a beber mi Mocha Latina y compose something new here johnny-on-the spot. here goes nothing.

the talon-grasp'ed serpent's bearer knows
its eaglets cry from both sides for relief;
and all along the border, like a thief
its neighbor barks a counterfeited prose:

su vecindad no es lugar de paz
nuestros hijos van a descubrir
el otro lado lives in certain fear
y sus palabras, banish'ed atras

the border, broken, won't be on the mend
with waxen wings nor pencil-sharpened ire;
and mortar, whether masonry or fire
can only seal, partition or defend

okay, that was a little too precious. i'm hungry. it's 7:14, so i've been sitting here a half hour. i'm gonna grab some grub (amy and the kids are enjoying spring break, so i'm a bachelor for a bit) and go back to toolbox to post my lentenblog for today.

o designer

propel me scratch claw into dry dirt 'til my nails scrape against buried box
trace outline bring into relief the woodgrain the bolt the hasp
the clasp
the lock
be my boltcutter
open
open the heavy-lidded apertures
reveal the better-suited treasures
(i thought i was a pattern of you
some semblance
a little lower than the angels
but you stitch
or weave
or bind and unbind
and cure
and all i do
all i ever do
is accentuate order or accentuate chaos
with color, line, repetition and sleight of hand
and allow myself to be used
once again)
will you shine the light closer so i can
pry this lid
will i shut out the light so i can
ply my trade
curtains drawn, drawn, thumbnailed, color-balanced kelvin-rated
articulated as a journalism major might
the joke's on me
but i let it be
i don't intend to spend fifty cents on every word
will you shine the light closer, i can almost
can you see that corner is almost
let me hold the light while you try
what will we do when this caja de plomo is finally
loose
si, cuando todo es luz
all around us is light and life and swordbent plowshares

575

Alton Darby

Alton Darby's yard
There's lots of dandelions
A field of yellow

by a first grader named audrey [via].

gmh

the Holy Ghost over the bent / world broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings

the corner

the corner

here the clean dim light
there the eighth of the inch between
plastic and aluminum

Welch’s Sparkling Grape Soda
purple touching saffron oriflamme.
Saint Denis, roll over, constancy

In Hoc Signo Vinces
here, again, the dim glow
zero point one two five

and what emerges is my tendencies
and your helplessness to escape
and here we are, listening, talking

but I have to go now

and this, by Brueggeman

"…On our own, we conclude:
that there is not enough to go around
we are going to run short

of money
of love
of grades
of publications
of sex
of beer
of members
of years
of life

we should seize the day…
seize the goods…
seize our neighbor’s goods
because there is not enough to go around
and in the midst of our perceived deficit;

You come
You come giving bread in the wilderness
You come giving children at the 11th hour
You come giving homes to the exiles
You come giving futures to the shut-down
You come giving Easter joy to the dead
You come … fleshed … in Jesus

And we watch while
the blind receive their sight
the lame walk
the lepers are cleansed
the deaf hear
the dead are raised
the poor dance and sing.

We watch … and we take
    
food we did not grow and
life we did not invent and
future that is gift and gift and gift and
families and neighbors who sustain us
when we do not deserve it.

It dawns on us, late rather than soon, that
You give food in due season
you open your hand
and satisfy the desire of every living thing.

By your giving,
break our cycles of imagined scarcity
override our presumed deficits
quiet our anxieties of lack
transform our perceptual field to see
the abundance...mercy upon mercy
blessing upon blessing.

Sink your generosity deep into our lives

that your much-ness may expose our false lack
that endlessly receiving, we may endlessly give,

so that the world may be made Easter new,
without greedy lack, but only wonder
without coercive need, but only love
without destructive greed, but only praise
without aggression and evasiveness...
all things Easter new...

all around us, toward us and by us
all things Easter new.

Finish your creation...
in wonder, love and praise. Amen.

aloe baby slowdown

a simple prayer for peace.

Let my worried heart be calm
Let my anxious striving cease

        — Pamela Neumann 3/8/06

My friend Pamela still urgently needs support—of the financial ilk—in order to make her impending move to Nicaragua (to work with Food For The Hungry) happen. I will ask you on her behalf: please give generously. Many readers of this blog are more than capable of a one-time gift equivalent of a nice dinner for two out on the town. Or the cost of an annual magazine subscription that you'll never really read. Or a month's supply of lattes. Consider donating a monthly amount. Click here to donate and learn more.

On Epiphany

On Epiphany

incense, gold and myrrh:
(arouse. reign. be anointed.)
soon your time will come.

-prs 010606

Communiqué Journal - Advent 2005

Announcing .... the rebirth of Communiqué: An Online Literary & Arts Journal. In ancient Rome, the adventus was a celebration honoring an anniversary: the date of the emperor’s rise to power. The Church later adopted the term Advent to mark the arrival of a different kind of Emperor – the Son of God in human form. It’s a season for honoring the past and sharing hope for the future. We could think of no time more appropriate to announce the rebirth of Communiqué Journal

When we published our first issue in 1998, Communiqué was one of the first of its kind. Eight years later, sites devoted to the intersection of faith, culture, and the arts permeate the web. The fact that there has been a proliferation of like-minded publications is a blessing. Beginning in the spring, Communiqué will be back with new offerings, published three times annually.

We celebrate the past.
For this, our Advent issue, we have searched our archives and identified eight of most compelling pieces we’ve featured in the past, including poetry by Luci Shaw, a short story by Greg Garrett, and the Byzantine iconography of John Snogren.

We live in the present.
We are pleased to feature a new essay by Troy Bronsink. "The Advent Community and the Emergence of God's Dreams for Creation" looks at four lectionary texts through an emergent theological perspective. We also stumbled across the poem "I Ache For That Long Lost Light" quite by accident. The verses were penned by Communiqué friend Louis Hemmings — a Dubliner who deals in rare and used theological books. His verses, nested in the signature file of a recent email, caught our eye. He granted us permission to share the poem with our readers this season.

We look hopefully to the future.
With this announcement, we joyfully await fresh submissions for next year’s issues. We continue to seek original stories, poems, essays, reviews, and art that explore, question, re-imagine, examine and celebrate aspects of culture and Christian conviction. The deadline for submissions for the spring issue is February 15.

Paul Soupiset, co-managing editor

http://communiquejournal.org

confessional

forgive me father for i want to have my cake and eat it too i want to have concepted the cake and sketched it out i wanted to have enjoyed shopping for its ingredients i wanted the experience of cracking the eggs sifting the flour scraping the batter and licking the frosting. i want to have my cake and photograph it too in medium-format black and white and then write a poem about the cake that inspires others i want to paint a painting that will capture the cake for posterity i want to celebrate other cake-bakers and create an online forum showcasing their recipes and after writing a clever short story about cake-bakers i want to return to my poetry journal and set my cake-poem to music with just the right meter just the right chords just the right key just the right instrumentation and  i want to record my cakesong in the studio with other musician friends and in so-doing i accidentally will distance myself from me.

(this is how i am)

flock - billy collins

flock

It has been calculated that
each copy of the Gutenburg Bible
required the skins of 300 sheep.

I can see them
squeezed into the holding pen
behind the stone building
where the printing press is housed.

All of them squirming around
to find a little room
and looking so much alike
it would be nearly impossible to count them.

And there is no telling which one of them
will carry the news
that the Lord is a Shepherd,
one of the few things
they already know.

- billy collins

Billy Collins was U.S. Poet Laureate from 2001 through 2003.
He's been the New York State Poet Laureate since January 2004.

your word falls on dead ears and moves me nonetheless (native tongues)

I.
    awl, fulcrum, dovetail, Teflon tape,
    sawhorse, junction box, sheetrock.
II.
    art, filetype, hyperlink, Gaussian blur,
    portfolio, marker comp, craft services.
III.
    boat, fisherman, spirit, Sea of Galilee,
    blood, wheat and bread, ashes.
IV.
    brief, fungible, advocacy, Armani,
    pacing, closing argument, reassurance.
V.
    hug, diapers, playgroup, Keedo dresses,
    keys, schedule conflict, daughters.
VI.
    clay, batik, canvas, Rit dye,
    barstool, stained glass, matte board.
VII.
    pitch, capo, fretboard, Augustine Reds,
    rosewood, calloused, arpeggio.

prs 11/21/05

this weekend

This weekend was banded and thrown from mitten-hands
Bounced, skittered, rested on my mock-saltillo porch. Open.

Sitting on the front steps I play Jordan’s violin
    poorly. Coaxing “Pictures of Matchstick Men” for the neighborhood
    from the rental instrument,
    fretting the lack of semitone dividers

Emma smiles, Kate squeals, Abi sways,
    Jordan grows taller, I think.

We run errands while Amy’s out
    in my sputtering, polluting sedan.

We trade loud summer driving
        (August A/C busted: windows down:
          radio and wind whisper-screaming, buffeting my ears)

for quiet autumn driving
        (November heater droning: windows up:
         NPR midwest accents, sidling hearthside to tell, tell)

And the model train seems interesting again
And I find the drop-forged crescent wrench
And I put Kate’s training wheels onto the hand-me-down cycle
And she rides and falls and doesn’t cry but
    bravely,
    resolutely,
    hops back on, so unlike me

-prs 11/21/05

map the nevermap

and here is where the filament went black
the copper spectrometric coil of you.
our hopes our dreams our best-beloved hours
just flowers, now, and crammed into the cup
that sits spot-welded to the headstone plate
if your homeric epithet rang true
our paths will somehow --

                "map the nevermap,"
she might have said he might have just inferred
the Band-Aid overprint was Scooby-Doo
and you were crying, sitting on the toilet seat.
and I the hydrogen peroxide bearer
and dry the shoulder start the running tap.
the daughter washes--

                   water to the wound,
He might have saved himself, see Mary, John,
your motherbrotherfatherson awaits

prs 11/16/2005

119:18, 19; 25

open my eyes that i may see
wonderful things in your law
i am a stranger on earth
so not hide your commands from me
i am laid low in the dust;
preserve my life according to your word.

Ryan Sharp update

updater:

Friday, October 28, 2005
Ryan Sharp + House Concert at the Soupiset casa
An evening of music and story and food.
127 Irvington Dr. + San Antonio TX 78209 + (210) 829-1539
Dinner 7pm; Concert 8pm;
ages 15 and over please.
$10 at the door plus a “covered dish”*

Ryan Sharp / The Cobalt Season / House Concert
We’re having them down to San Antonio for a house concert on Friday the 28th, about a week-and-a-half from today. If you're interested in supporting the thoughtful intersection of faith and the arts, and supporting a fellow sojourner, and listening to well-crafted music, then come. It'll follow typical house concert protocol: you bring ten bucks and a covered dish:

*The money goes straight to the performer; the food gets eaten by you at the house concert. You can bring whatever to eat. Water and Tea will be provided; feel free to bring beverage of your choice. Interested? Please let me know now via email.

Oh: Bring extra money for his CD; you’ll want one or two this holiday season.
http://www.myspace.com/cobaltseason

Influences       The Doves, Radiohead, Troy Bronsink, Deccatree, Mike Barnet, Damien Rice, James Taylor, The Indigo Girls, Over The Rhine, Rich Mullins, U2, Muse, Magnet, Sufjan Stevens, David Gray, Pedro The Lion, Kent, Switchfoot, Whiskeytown, Lyle Lovett, Ryan Adams, Jonatha Brooke, Toad The Wet Sprocket, Travis, Patti Griffin, Nickel Creek

Sounds Like       ...coming home...crisp, autumn air...angst and confusion...despairing hope...disillusionment with religion and politics...

michael toy / verse

michael has posted his "a lament of emergence."

what's my deal?

i blink and miss everything. this weekend rudy carrasco was in town; luci shaw, eugene peterson AND richard foster were right up the road at laity lodge. and i'm here bacheloring it, playing around with a model train set when i could have hit the road and engaged. arrrrgh.

for you sports fans, it's like taking a nap and waking up to find you missed lance armstrong, shaquille o'neal, jeff gordon and tiger woods, all who knocked on your front door en masse and wanted to know if you could come out and play.

or something.

Without regret
The slug--how he melts
(the psalmist tells us) as he flows
over stones, painting
a trail of light
that leads me nowhere
I want to go.

The snake writes his way
through scrub, bruising no whisker
of fiber. Only a line like a finger
drawing on sand.
In spring an empty
silver sleeve shapes the air.

Glass has no memory. Drops
track down and vanish,
leaving no stain.
Every year winter shrivels, white
tissue paper in a flame.
No one minds.

--Luci Shaw

beside this great reverse

           How shallow former shadows seem beside this great reverse,

           As darkness swallows up the light of all the universe.

           Creation shivers at the shock, the temple rends its veil.

           A pallid stilness stifles time and nature's motions fail.

           This is no mid-day fantasy, no flight of fevered brain.

           With vengeance awful, grim, and real, chaos is come again.

           The hands that formed us from the soil are nailed upon the cross.

           The Word that gave us life and breath expires in utter loss.

           Yet deep within this darkness lives a Love so fierce and free,

           That arcs all voids and risk supreme! embraces agony.

            Its perfect testament is etched in iron, blood, and wood.

            With awe we glimpse its true import and dare to call it good.

Carl P. Daw, Jr

thanks to my mom for sending this to me. their church's choir is practicing this piece for maundy thursday.

san fernando cathedral

and somewhere low is where i looked
head bowed, un-known

...

vine charcoal:
pulverized
in shot glasses

clarendon:
bilingual,
in two columns

lay reader:
palabras
desconocidos

form two lines:
to receive
(two lines form)

...

and lonely low is where i looked
also a stranger

slipping back into the night
rainy night

-p.r.s.
ash wednesday, 2005

embark

disembed
(the swimming pool ladder diminishes)

the tide rises and
the current whispers: embark.

let go of your constructs and face the
vertigo that has always been

let go of your moorings and embrace the
arc of your new, fluid trajectory

let go of your cargo and
send depth charges. fathom.

we will set fire to these ships soon enough
but, for now ::