Sunday, May 12, 2019

Treasure, draft no. 2


The things Mary treasured in her heart
were not things--

To know what to treasure
is the treasure.

Wednesday, May 8, 2019

Breakfast by the shore, draft no. 2

by Jen Hunt

God does not seem to be that concerned about calendars.
If you have your weekend planned on Friday
like you’d always hoped you could
planned it maybe even on Thursday night for once
actually planned
what you are going to do that weekend with your
free time
whether you call it Sabbath, rest, “your” time
and if, by the time you get to the weekend
you stumble over a
Friday
and just when you thought
there is no way you could recover from a day that sad
almost as sad as Good Friday
which I always in my mind
confuse with Black Friday and am so sad because
Freud was right
I often think goods are good and God is black
And so my mind twists these and I forget
that no Friday no matter how bad
can be blacker than the Friday that was Good
And the Good Friday was so good
in the kind of way that only God knows how to be good
that it un-bads every other kind of day there is
if you let it
and then, when you reach your weekend
you find [laugh, gasp] God was already there
waiting for you to pull up a chair
and He is so glad that you showed up that he invites you to breakfast

and he gives you fish that he caught
fish that he made
fish that he let swim wherever they wanted to go because he,
being God and man and good and wise
is able to trust the fish
he knows what is in a fish and in a man, the bad--and the good
the fish that swims in the ocean that he made
trusts the fish will know when it hears its master’s voice and will gladly
jump into his net because he knows or she knows
--I have never been able to tell the difference between male and female fish have you?
But God does--
the fish, he or she, knows
that being in God’s net
cooked on a fire that God has made
is the reason he, the fish, was made… she was made
and when they, the fish, are then eaten
they know that was their purpose
so they would never dream swim away

And I know that when I run to God’s breakfast call
I will not be turned away.
His menu does not run out.
It is inconceivable that the Lord who made the fish and who made your stomach
and who made the whale
and the whale’s stomach
and Jonah and gastric juices
and spit
could forget about hunger, your hunger
could forget food and that you need it.
Because he had a stomach too
and food and drink that we know nothing about
and a tongue and a mouth
that would never spit you out.
No, he is never thirsty.
Nor, if we’ll let him
are we.

Wednesday, January 23, 2019

The Painting

By Jen Hunt



By the time the painting comes

I had put on layaway

The painting I had so much fun saving for

selling for

hawking for

releasing for

by the time the painting comes

the painting of the tree looking from the roots up

that I was so sad when I thought it had burned in the fire

with all the other paintings my friend had done

(but it, being elsewhere, had been spared)

when the painting comes

and it’s coming sooner than I ever thought it would

when the painting comes

I don’t know if I will have a space to hang it

anymore

because my house is now so deliciously

empty and free


Friday, January 11, 2019

Pulse


by Jen Hunt


Looking down
I see my pulse
trembling the wine

in the cup
the tiny cup pinched
between my forefinger
and thumb

I cup the crumb
beneath the cup
in the nest
of my palm

In this spell
before I feast
my soul rests
cradled

by the helping
the mother bird
brings