Hymns are Poetry Too!

So many songs have the smooth and beautiful quality of a poem. This is for sure one of those. The lovely piece "Come thy Fount" was written in 1757 by Robert Robinson, when he was only 22 years old!

Whether read or sung, the words have an undeniable quality that always makes me feel God's presence.

Come, Thou Fount of every blessing,
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace;
Streams of mercy, never ceasing,
Call for songs of loudest praise.
Teach me some melodious sonnet,
Sung by flaming tongues above.
Praise the mount! I’m fixed upon it,
Mount of Thy redeeming love.

Sorrowing I shall be in spirit,
Till released from flesh and sin,
Yet from what I do inherit,
Here Thy praises I’ll begin;
Here I raise my Ebenezer;
Here by Thy great help I’ve come;
And I hope, by Thy good pleasure,
Safely to arrive at home.

Jesus sought me when a stranger,
Wandering from the fold of God;
He, to rescue me from danger,
Interposed His precious blood;
How His kindness yet pursues me
Mortal tongue can never tell,
Clothed in flesh, till death shall loose me
I cannot proclaim it well.

O to grace how great a debtor
Daily I’m constrained to be!
Let Thy goodness, like a fetter,
Bind my wandering heart to Thee.
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
Prone to leave the God I love;
Here’s my heart, O take and seal it,
Seal it for Thy courts above.

O that day when freed from sinning,
I shall see Thy lovely face;
Clothed then in blood washed linen
How I’ll sing Thy sovereign grace;
Come, my Lord, no longer tarry,
Take my ransomed soul away;
Send thine angels now to carry
Me to realms of endless day.

Remembering Lena Horne

“My identity is very clear to me now. I am a black woman. I’m free. I no longer have to be a ‘credit.’ I don’t have to be a symbol to anybody; I don’t have to be a first to anybody. I don’t have to be an imitation of a white woman that Hollywood sort of hoped I’d become. I’m me, and I’m like nobody else.”

- Ms. Lena Horne at age 80

Check out CNN's Photo essay Remembering Lena Horne. The legacy of this lovely and dynamic singer and civil rights leader will not be quickly forgotten.

RIP Sweet Songbird!

What Can Make You Jump

US Poet Laureate Billy Collins once said, "Not since Taylor Mali has there been a poet of the likes of Taylor Mali"

Oh so true! Mali translates his academic mastery of the English lanaguage into a highly polished and accessible delivery. He writes about things we all can relate to in a way that we all wish that we could. This is one cool cat!!

Anyway...while listening to some old poetry podcasts, I found this oldie but goodie that always makes me tear up. A poem about his late wife...


Depression, too, is a kind of fire
BY Taylor Mali

...and I was going to write a poem
about how fire is the only thing
that can make a person jump out a window.

And maybe I’m an idiot for thinking I could have saved her—
call me her knight in shattered armor—
could have loved her more,
or told the truth about children.

But depression, too, is a kind of fire.
And I know nothing of either.

Text from Spindle Magazine

i don’t understand you God

Although we know that we are anything but, it is tempting to live our lives as if we are invincible. Despite constant reminders of the frailty of life, it is easy to believe that our technology and law enforcement and all-around street smarts are enough to sustain us. There is nothing like a natural disaster to shatter that idea. In just a moment, the earth can turn turns against us, its feeble captors, and reminds us that we are small.

As I watched footage of Tuesday's massive earthquake in Haiti, I couldn't help but be hit by the magnitude of the damage and perplexed by the problem of recovery. Even the US, with all of its wealth and prestige buckled and bowed low under the weight of Hurricane Katrina. Much less a country with an annual per capita income of less than $400 and an average life expectancy of 53. How will they recover...tomorrow and in the years to come?

Anyway, all of this deep thought reminded of a fabulous piece that Kelly Zen-Yie Tsai wrote after the quake and tsunami that hit the Indian Ocean and claimed more than 200,000 lives. Another tragedy that left me with so many questions for God. ::le sigh:: Tsai gives voice to my confusion, but also leaves me with a sense of hope.

Enjoy the piece below and remember that life is too short. Don't let a grudge keep you from telling someone you love them. Tomorrow, it might be too late.

ps...if you're looking for an easy way to help, you can send a $10 Donation by Texting ‘Haiti’ to 90999. The charge will be tacked on to your monthly cell phone bill.

Aftershock
BY Kelly Zen-Yie Tsai

the week the tsunami hit
i started reading the Bible again
for the first time
since I was five years old

so cried CNN, the Associated Press,
Reuters, and the BBC
so cried the Red Cross
and nations across the world
glaring at each other
to up the ante
to loosen their purse strings

i turn on the morning radio
and there is so much laughter
the mouths are huge
monstrous

as prayers and exhausted sighs of relief
sounded from every phone call,
every family member:
i am alive
i survived
i can hear you

a sober vision

as i close Bible pages
take it by the spine
and throw it against the wall

it breaks open
leaves trembling like lips

i don’t understand you God
but i do understand that
it’s not your fault

Listen Up!! The "Oldies" Have Something to Say

I know you’ve heard the “uphill both ways in the freezing snow with no shoes on” stories more times than you can count, but please put that angst aside for just one day. There’s more to our parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles than all that. At least that’s what NPR’s Story Corps is saying. I guess you never know until you ask, right? In celebration of today's National Day of Listening, NPR is encouraging people across the country to grab their tape recorders, ask some tough questions of their loved ones, and listen to the answers. Easy enough.

Pass on the Black Friday craziness and spend some time with the "oldies but goodies" in your family. This is the second year that they’re doing this and I think it will bring a lot of families closer together (or at least help us understand where we inherited our crazy neuroses from). Either way, there’s nothing like communication to show us that we’re a lot more similar than we want to think.

I’m planning on grilling my mom today (check out the two of us below). I plan to ask all the tough questions. Like...ALL the tough questions – Stay tuned:-)



Not totally sold, check out the USA Today article. If the media's covering it, it must be legit!!

National Day of Listening promotes oral history
BY Travis Loller, Associated Press Writer

NASHVILLE — A national oral history project is trying to start a new tradition for Black Friday. Instead of hunting for bargains, StoryCorps suggests families sit down together and talk about their lives on a National Day of Listening.

Amanda Rigell, a 30-year-old middle school teacher from Johnson City, Tenn., interviewed her grandmother, who was 89 at the time, for the first National Day of Listening last year.

"She was reluctant at first," Rigell said. "She doesn't really talk about herself." But then she talked for more than two and a half hours.

"She talked about her early education. She went to a tiny little school, I think there was only one other person there for a while. And she talked about drinking fresh milk from a cow. I guess that shouldn't have surprised me, but it did," Rigell said.

StoryCorps is a nonprofit project that seeks to preserve the stories of ordinary people. Rigell first learned about it when she heard some of those stories broadcast on public radio during her morning commute. She had already interviewed two people at StoryCorps recording booths when she and her father decided to interview her grandmother at home.

"I'm really glad we did it last year because her health has been declining," she said. "There was a while last month when she couldn't speak."

Rigell said her grandmother, who lives in Campbell County near the Kentucky border, was around for all the "big events" of her childhood. Some of her fondest memories of her grandmother involve home cooked meals and "amazing" buttermilk biscuits. But there were a lot of things Rigell didn't know about her.

Rigell recorded the interview on her computer and plans to give copies as Christmas presents.

More

I Like You Like Frat Boys and Pirates Like Booty!!

You know I couldn't go more than a few days without a love poem:-)

Mike McGee's Like is another one of those oldie but goodies that really embody the slam movement. Engaging, well-delivered and, with the exception of the Muppets fisting line, very thoughtful. Yeah. He actually said "Like Muppets like fisting." LOL. That line still makes me blush, even after hearing it so many times. Good stuff, though. An all around fabulous piece.

For you know who:-)

"I like you a whole bunch of a lot.
you're a pocket full of awesome.
I like you similar to the way that frat boys and pirates like booty."

::Hilarity::

Text for Taylor

For those of you who prefer reading over listening, here's the text of yesterday's Taylor Mail piece. Literally, there are too many gems in here! Read carefully and enjoy!

:-)

How to Write a Political Poem
BY Taylor Mali

However it begins, it's gotta be loud
and then it's gotta get a little bit louder.
Because this is how you write a political poem
and how you deliver it with power.

Mix current events with platitudes of empowerment.
Wrap up in rhyme or rhyme it up in rap until it sounds true.

Glare until it sinks in.

Because somewhere in Florida, votes are still being counted.
I said somewhere in Florida, votes are still being counted!

See, that's the Hook, and you gotta' have a Hook.
More than the look, it's the hook that is the most important part.
The hook has to hit and the hook's gotta fit.
Hook's gotta hit hard in the heart.

Because somewhere in Florida, votes are still being counted.

And Dick Cheney is peeing all over himself in spasmodic delight.
Make fun of politicians, it's easy, especially with Republicans
like Rudy Giuliani, Colin Powell, and . . . Al Gore.
Create fatuous juxtapositions of personalities and political philosophies
as if communism were the opposite of democracy,
as if we needed Darth Vader, not Ralph Nader.

More

How to Write a Political Poem - Oldie But Goodie

Taylor Mali has so many great poems, but this is my absolute favorite.

It's one of those "funny because it's true" pieces that truthfully and comedically tells it like it really is. It seems like there's almost an un-spoken formula on how to write and speak a political poem that performance poets learn at birth. I know that I've committed my fair share of the things he describes in this piece...especially the last bit. Ouch! Guilty as charged:-)

Because all you have to do to end a political poem is
close your eyes,
lower your voice, and end by saying:

the same line three times,
the same line three times,
the same line three times.

hilarity!!