Mammoths were
cotton in sheets' thread

bare lee, frigid cove

pockets drove rooks
as snows pilled piled

thick mammoths, whisper birds

bones in the white heave,
Whole as the white heave-ho!

marker on the poster arrows

pointing, labeling

names of parts. What mystery and hatred

is the will of passion's kept unlabeled Self-

seeking magic in pens.

boards from the wire fall

sides for the bare breaths

fingers hand herbs; deaths

punctured loot rains, rust kneeling

clung (quaint harvest) lutes in the rain stir

pot on the coils pluck, kettle warm,

settle warm the iron bed.

Wedding Shadow

wake from the root, grow one
up gray cover.

Wedding Shadow

lain over soot, come one
earth wave cover

Wedding Shadow

walks no face, of One
from mornings given, two

Wedding Shadows, two are
one, long white laughing

at the hands' repository, rough
words, sad missing what never
never never was seen—and more, never
never never returned by one
of shadows weeping where the
other grew, danced, turned, walking earless

became shade.

i.
run side Wedding

wake up Wedding

lain earth Wedding

walks from Wedding one,

at words never never of other

became

ii.
one cover.
Shadow one cover.
Shadow one cover Shadow One
two are laughing
rough never never one
the earless shade

iii.
from the foot turn long white
from the root grow gray

over soot come wave
no face

of mornings given Shadows two long white the hands'
repository

sad missing what
never was seen—and more
never returned by
shadows weeping where
grew, danced, turned, walking

watch the man shake my hand, his eyes my eyes
minute watching what words in what form
cool gelatinous.

what money bbalse seeding hoep aessmbsel.
45 minutes to less
than yes, two.

I am a woman
in the bonnet on the deck
of HERS heaving, occupied
hands, my holding the bow
in place beneath my chin.

He is a man
in the boards of the ship
HIS riding occupied salt,
HIS cutting waves as foam
beards liquid blue.

She is a vixen,
that Sail billowing
far above my hand-held
bow & bonnet blown, HER
Sails continue to carry me
seasick, footless foe, small feet,
clamped chin, hollow hull &
grateful deck, boards, keeping
me dry.

The books are slovenly stacked. Hope moves them from place to place. I desire to know them, keep them, absorb their beginnings and transits, digest their authors' characters in paper kept. Better at choosing lotions before bed or dressing, I continue to move books around. They are wonderful, wonderful, like children fostered mine, though I've never written two, and have not yet fostered a child. To know of them is a canyon's view, at one time loving each possible, remembered hold as ledge, homing cataclysmic sight lines, every sunrise and sunset revealing another's passage before me.

Library books:
RICK BASS, The Lives of Rocks, Stories; published by Houghton Mifflin Company; Boston and New York; 2006. Other books by Rick Bass are The Deer Pasture; Wild to the Heart; The Watch; Oil Notes; Winter; The Ninemile Wolves; Platte River; In the Loyal Mountains; The Lost Grizzlies; The Book of Yaak; The Sky, the Stars, the Wilderness; Where the Sea Used to Be; Fiber; The New Wolves; Brown Dog of the Yaak; Colter; The Hermit's Story; The Roadless Yaak (Editor); Caribou Rising; Falling from Grace in Texas (Coeditor with Paul Christensen); and The Diezmo. (I have begun reading the first story in this book and re-began it, reading aloud to my husband. The first story is really sad. I may move on to the second.)

SEBASTIAN BARRY, The Secret Scripture, A Novel; published by Viking Penguin, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.; New York, New York; 2008. Other writings by Sebastian Barry are (fiction) A Long Long Way; Annie Dunne; The Whereabouts of Eneas McNulty; (plays) The Steward of Christendom; Sebastian Barry: Plays 1; Our Lady of Sligo; Hinterland; Whistling Psyche; Fred and Jane; The Pride of Parnell Street; (poems) The Water-Colourist; Fanny Hawke Goes To The Mainland For Ever; and The Pinkening Boy. (I am re-reading this book.)

WILLIAM E. BARRETT, The Lilies Of The Field; published by Doubleday & Company, Inc.; Garden City, New York; 1962. Other books by William E. Barrett are The Edge of Things; The Empty Shrine; The Sudden Strangers; The Shadows of the Images; Woman On Horseback; The Left Hand Of God; and Flight From Youth. (I have not read this book.)

MARGARET CRAVEN, Walk Gently This Good Earth; published by G. P. Putnam's Sons; New York; 1977. Margaret Craven authored the book I Heard the Owl Call My Name. (I began reading this story, and thought more of northwestern America, and fathers leaving their children behind, as well as thinking of a woman I know whose childhood was there. The title is wonderful, though, and reading the book may bring me closer to my friend, and closer to "fathers". There is also a piece of mail in this book that I am to pass on to my husband. Reading books is easily interrupted.)

Books in a separate stack, given to me to read:
RORY NOLAND; The Heart Of The Artist: A Character-Building Guide for You & Your Ministry Team; published by Zondervan Publishing House, a division of HarperCollinsPublishers; Grand Rapids, Michigan; 1999. (This is a very good book, belonging to my cousin by marriage, Cory James.)

CINDI WOOD; Too Blessed For This Mess: The Frazzled Female's Guide To Overcoming Stress; published by B&H Publishing Group; Nashville, Tennessee; 2007. (This book was given me by my twice hairdresser, Becki. It is a valuable book, and Becki is a valuable hairdresser; as is Jennifer, my long-time-friend hairdresser. I have been asked by my older daughter if I might be approaching menopause. Perhaps. Either way, my hair wants tending, and books tease the gray matter like nothing else.)

JERRY BRIDGES, BOB BEVINGTON; The Bookends Of The Christian Life; published by Crossway Books; Wheaton, Illinois; 2009. Another book by these authors is The Great Exchange: My Sin For His Righteousness. (I have not begun this book.)

MARTHA PEACE; The Excellent Wife, A Biblical Perspective, expanded edition; published by Focus Publishing Inc.; Bemidji, Minnesota; 1995, 1999, 2005. (I have begun this book and will finish it. I do like that it is filled with scripture. That is its good to me. I think I am not teachable, in the sense that is good for others to perceive. These years, trusting others for anything good at all has been challenged by my own ample willingness to flout my own choices and the opinions of others who appear stable. Stability shifts, intangible, and to know or think or trust God's Will for my intangible staying or shifting has proven, by now, to be a great joy that belongs to me and my Jesus Christ—God having given room to flout my chosen sacred, for a time, enacting His Mercy. I may say it is a joy, and I may lie and repent. But I dare not lie again by logic, because I believe Jesus has my pain and scars, and those of my husband, as well as his and my willing choices at any point in time. God has willed for me to live and for him to live. And God has willed for us to live together in goodness. ... beyond that, deeper than all intractable logic, is God's Loving acceptance of The Slain Lamb, Jesus Christ risen in the heavens, exalted and embracing His having given, The Holy Spirit's healing work upon the earth, to and through those who will believe at any point in Christ's Open Mercy. Gracious God. God is gracious to me.)

Chuck Simmons, teaching with his wife, Beth, this morning in Sunday school: A close relationship costs me my selfishness.

The Power of the Cross
Words & Music by Getty & Townend

Oh, to see the dawn of the darkest day:
Christ on the road to Calvary.
Tried by sinful men, torn and beaten, then
nailed to a cross of wood.

Oh, to see the pain written on Your face,
Bearing the awesome weight of sin.
Ev'ry bitter thought, Ev'ry evil deed
crowning Your blood-stained brow.

Now the daylight flees, now the ground beneath
quakes as its Maker bows His head.
Curtain torn in two, dead are raised to life;
"Finished!" the vict'ry cry.

Oh, to see my name written in the wounds,
for through Your suffering I am free.
Death is crushed to death, life is mine to live,
Won through Your selfless love.

chorus (1-3):
This, the pow'r of the cross:
Christ became sin for us.
Took the blame, bore the wrath,
we stand forgiven at the cross.

chorus (4):
This, the pow'r of the cross:
Son of God, slain for us.
What a love! What a cost!
we stand forgiven at the cross.

i.
Like pulling [do.
Like ]two

ii.
waters [can]
heads,[ ride.

iii.
walls' agreeable tension keeps in line] [the
down, pushing up, pressing in Like force]
[do.
air busies itself with feathers and leaves its sound timpanums'
wings] [as metal, shaped for buses holding seats in rows,] [we

iv.
line] [the
force] [can]
wings] [as
rose] [we

hold weight relived in colors stretching there.

Stretch bars hung-sheer, cream pass promise through-weaves After's
noon repose, this glide—; Rock sit, words off, set two, sky's rain, ice lids
in patched-white striae, ceiling's Day.

1 Bless the LORD, O my soul! O LORD my God, you are very great! You are clothed with splendor and majesty, 2 covering yourself with light as with a garment, stretching out the heavens like a tent. 3 He lays the beams of his chambers on the waters; he makes the clouds his chariot; he rides on the wings of the wind; 4 he makes his messengers winds, his ministers a flaming fire. 5 He set the earth on its foundations, so that it should never be moved. 6 You covered it with the deep as with a garment; the waters stood above the mountains. 7 At your rebuke they fled; at the sound of your thunder they took to flight. 8 The mountains rose, the valleys sank down to the place that you appointed for them. 9 You set a boundary that they may not pass, so that they might not again cover the earth. 10 You make springs gush forth in the valleys; they flow between the hills; 11 they give drink to every beast of the field; the wild donkeys quench their thirst. 12 Beside them the birds of the heavens dwell; they sing among the branches. 13 From your lofty abode you water the mountains the earth is satisfied with the fruit of your work. 14 You cause the grass to grow for the livestock and plants for man to cultivate, that he may bring forth food from the earth 15 and wine to gladden the heart of man, oil to make his face shine and bread to strengthen man’s heart. 16 The trees of the LORD are watered abundantly, the cedars of Lebanon that he planted. 17 In them the birds build their nests; the stork has her home in the fir trees. 18 The high mountains are for the wild goats; the rocks are a refuge for the rock badgers. 19 He made the moon to mark the seasons; the sun knows its time for setting. 20 You make darkness, and it is night, when all the beasts of the forest creep about. 21 The young lions roar for their prey, seeking their food from God. 22 When the sun rises, they steal away and lie down in their dens. 23 Man goes out to his work and to his labor until the evening. 24 O LORD, how manifold are your works! In wisdom have you made them all; the earth is full of your creatures. 25 Here is the sea, great and wide, which teems with creatures innumerable, living things both small and great. 26 There go the ships, and Leviathan, which you formed to play in it. 27 These all look to you, to give them their food in due season. 28 When you give it to them, they gather it up; when you open your hand, they are filled with good things. 29 When you hide your face, they are dismayed; when you take away their breath, they die and return to their dust. 30 When you send forth your Spirit, they are created, and you renew the face of the ground. 31 May the glory of the LORD endure forever; may the LORD rejoice in his works, 32 who looks on the earth and it trembles, who touches the mountains and they smoke! 33 I will sing to the LORD as long as I live; I will sing praise to my God while I have being. 34 May my meditation be pleasing to him, for I rejoice in the LORD. 35 Let sinners be consumed from the earth, and let the wicked be no more! Bless the LORD, O my soul! Praise the LORD!

Pressing sun
my crown betrays
popping fellows
foundry; Grafted
shafts all
balanced line
Roof to cellar
basement climb
once plow

field
grown trees
& stumps &

hollows of our dear's

retreat; so
leveled bricks
as earth-stacked

corn, and mortars

poured child's
ligament out
on a table

balanced lain,
& served or
bound, thus aired
their wounds;
mend forest's
holes & deer's
retreat &
broken stumps
plowed innocent.

11:28PM