Divinity of Christ and The Christmas Concert on Orcas Island at Victorian Valley Chapel
Two poems by R.J. Keeler.
Divinity of Christ
Divinity of Christ:
The gathering light of candles scores
my guttering faith, a cyst--
refracted by these pithy flames
it needs endure a lance.
My frail faith, my Christocentric ill,
canst thou be ignorance,
or spite? Or via negativa?
Or, —no! Divinest sadism?
Were Christ at hand in living flesh
would He His grace and chrism
sustain—or bow to grace this man?
The search for truth sustains
the man—the quest for truth, a pathless
land. But truth bestained
sports tiny teeth—they know no end.
In truth, my faith has rived.
But He found His through life on earth;
now lifts His hand to shrive
my frail faith, to heal that wound.
Quite alien but curt:
neti neti! Not this, not this!
Such Upanishads avert
Christ’s tender, holy blessing.
The gathering light of candles scores
my guttering faith, a cyst--
refracted by these pithy flames
it needs endure a lance.
My frail faith, my Christocentric ill,
canst thou be ignorance,
or spite? Or via negativa?
Or, —no! Divinest sadism?
Were Christ at hand in living flesh
would He His grace and chrism
sustain—or bow to grace this man?
The search for truth sustains
the man—the quest for truth, a pathless
land. But truth bestained
sports tiny teeth—they know no end.
In truth, my faith has rived.
But He found His through life on earth;
now lifts His hand to shrive
my frail faith, to heal that wound.
Quite alien but curt:
neti neti! Not this, not this!
Such Upanishads avert
Christ’s tender, holy blessing.
The Christmas Concert on Orcas Island at Victorian Valley ChapelThis ovarian island comforted ice
after Polaris sank and Archer followed. This glacier’s ice, many large-fish thick, lay black and silent in tented hollows. Then slowly homeward trudged our sun, that glacier's executioner; it flinched and shot its warmth, let ice recede, let flower and sky concur-- a moss that cradled snow now's home to melting song. Inside this tiny church a dozen candles flickered toward the narrow, crowded, public bench on which we sat—as when my mate comes home and leaves her tired, ur- ban creature outside the door. We sang tonight about a simple gift of myrrh. Above a cold and remnant mist, brilliant stars—unseen, unbidden-- blink and shuffle as Ave Maria signs all we commoners suffer hidden: our brightest fears, our darkest hopes. |
Born St. Paul, Minnesota. Lived in jungles of Colombia, S.A., up to age twelve. BS Mathematics NCSU, MS Computer Science UNC, MBA UCLA, Certificate in Poetry UW. Honorman, U.S. Naval Submarine School. “SS” (Submarine Service) qualified. Vietnam Service Medal. Honorable Discharge. Whiting Foundation Experimental Grant. P&W's Directory of Poets and Writers. Member IEEE, AAAS, AAP. The Boeing Company. Does not subscribe to the cattle-prod paradigm of poetry. May tend to melancholy.
