I.

A new neighbor, City Light Ministries, asks,
“Are you a doctor?” She is not the first to ask.
From the streets, the hopeful Blessed, a few,
will laugh if I grin and unfold my cupped hands
nesting the wren of a small poem.

“An inviter of poetry,” I say,
forty-two years joying with students
reading, writing, sharing lined-out words
suffered like little children come unto others
releasing tiny birds circling our classroom,

lighting and lifting, filling this shared space
with a new song, a measured healing.
Not, of course, what she had expected:
Take two aspirin and call the doctor in the morning.
It is always best if we both laugh.

II.

Sundays, I grieve for my friend displaced
from his church, his congregation seeking
direction, words for the journey, a meal
for the hungry, peace dropping slow,¹

enveloping the soul. He offered, each Sunday
worship, the Word the apostle John declared
was In The Beginning ² : Love, a noun, a verb.
Poetry from the pulpit.

Last Sunday, a woman I had not seen before
took my place, end of my pew,
not assigned, just understood. The pew behind
was available for me. I’m certain she knew

what she had done, so turned to face my scowl
and ask, “Have you found a new pastor?”
Shoulder blades flexed beneath her diaphanous
shawl, a second’s perception of wings unfurling.

Poet, what is wrong with you?
“No!” I said. No option of metaphorical language.
My stark dismissal. Turn around, woman,
or angel, or whatever you are–

usurper of my known place
on this hallowed pew.
Her eyes gave me pause:
“He was my pastor,” she said.

I suddenly needed to apologize
for being a poet. What solace in a poem?
No, I am not a physician.
Tomorrow I will tell my new neighbor.

Notes:

* Luke 4: 23 (KJV)
¹“peace comes dropping slow,” William Butler Yeats, “The Lake Isle of Innisfree”
² John 1: 1-5 (KJV)