Blanketed by cool grey fog mist, a

Throbbing diesel engine driving the

Slowly rotating screws of a

Tug boat more heard than seen

Chugging towards the dredging barge

Undertaking the otiose Sisyphus task 

Of navigability, against the wishes of

Artemis and Demeter who 

Always and forever win

A gnarled cottonwood tree stands

Sentinel in the sand lifting its few

Remaining branches aloft in salute to

Ring-billed gulls circling above 

Directing one another to schools of

Salmon coming to spawn and die

In the temporarily navigable channel

Connecting lake with lake and

Coastline with coxswain 

Blue-grey gnatcatcher and warbling vireo

Mingle songs of gentle kindness in eelgrass dunes

Where deer graze and opossums feast on

Disease-laden ticks hunting like Klansmen for blood

While fascist politicians driven by racist ideology

Affix their parasitical jaws into democracy to

The applause of gun-toting triumphalists

Waving flags of oppression over those of color

While ostensively exalting the Prince of Peace  

And thus the web was broken and the strings of

Time reverberated in dissonance out of

Tune with the resonating symphony of the planets

That sing in harmonious adoration of Mystery.

Eric Garner and Gaia alike cry for breath,

Choking on the greed of those more concerned with

The unborn than with living children scratching for

Food in landfills as their huts wash to the sea

Parents soon to perish with dysentery

Nurses and nuns, aid workers and missionaries,

Médecins Sans Frontières, chaplains and deacons,

A kind old lady, the gentleman on the bench, 

The one stricken with Multiple Sclerosis, 

Salesperson and homemaker, landscaper and sanitation worker,

Quietly connect with Mystery, join the hymn of the cosmos,

Lift their lives in prayer, gird their loins, and wash feet.

The army of God knows no weapon but prayer, service, and

Nonviolent cruciform love.

Relentless, scandalous and slow

Divine love melts hearts of stone

Allowing the sweet honey of grace to

Flow across the blighted waters and lands

Thy will is done

Thy Kingdom comes

As in heaven

So on earth

Omnia Vincit Amor

LRT May 2022