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Monthly Archives: March 2018

Holy Week 2018

31 Saturday Mar 2018

Posted by K.Lo in poetry

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Holy Week 2018

I have done nothing to prepare—
no self-reflection, no sacrifice,
no posturing of prayer—only
filled each day, like any other,
with the hollow fleeting tasks
of things that, once done, must
be done again: grade the papers,
buy the groceries, pay the bills,
wash the dishes, scrub the floor.
Each act a laboring toward
no other goal except completion,
a line drawn on a list. And so
I come before You with a mind
and heart distracted, cluttered,
my lamp empty of oil, the wick
untrimmed, sleeping through each
waking day. All I have to offer
is this palm frond of unworthiness,
this faith brittle and withered with
neglect. Who can declare the mighty
acts of the Lord or fully declare
his praise? No one, though perhaps
the tongue of one made dumb
by shame, carrying the stench
of offense but still desiring
to approach, poking at a heap
of ash hoping for an ember,
comes close.

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Sister Psalm

11 Sunday Mar 2018

Posted by K.Lo in poetry, publications

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Sister Psalm

While my sister lies on a recliner
3,000 miles away, a cocktail
of destruction dripping
into her bloodstream,
Carlos is showing me a magic trick.

Other students have shown me tricks before,
bad ones, the sleight of hand so obvious
I must feign amazement like a doting mother.
I look at the clock, the stack of papers
on my desk, and watch with weary skepticism
as Carlos shuffles his deck of cards.

It’s a complicated trick.  He holds out
the deck and I pick a card at random.
He has me put it back and shuffle
the deck myself, which I do, that small
mean part of me making it extra thorough.

He fans the deck face up.
“Do you see your card?”
“Yes.”
He divides the deck and fans it again.
“Do you see your card now?”
And so it goes, until I’m not sure
how he will ever find the right one,
though there must be some way
he’s keeping track.  Some formula
to all that dividing and shuffling.

Then he points across the room and says,
“Look in the second book on that shelf.”
I go and look, and there it is, my six of clubs,
buried inside a book on the other side of the room.

I tell him how good he is, and he says
his mother, who goes to church, doesn’t like his tricks.
That they are bad, something of the devil.

I think of all my prayers
for my sister’s healing, how much I want
a miracle, God’s own sleight of hand,

and how it is already here, maybe,
in Carlos’s triumphant face, here
in my startled gasp,
this holy devil reminder
of impossible things
made real.

(first published by CALYX Vol. 30:1 https://www.calyxpress.org/shop/30-1/ )

All Around the Men Are Tumbling

11 Sunday Mar 2018

Posted by K.Lo in poetry, publications

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All Around the Men Are Tumbling

All around the men are tumbling
down like statues after war,
painted idols smashed and crumbling.

Office hallways are now cannons rumbling
with the cold iron fire of lives torn.
All around the men are tumbling.

Titans of industry stumbling,
sleek suits split to the rotten core,
painted idols smashed and crumbling.

They claim it was a bit of bumbling,
a little fun—don’t be such a bore!
All around the men are tumbling,

hanging their heads, mumbling
apologies, bruised egos sore,
painted idols smashed and crumbling.

Who could have seen this humbling
coming, this opening of doors?
All around the men are tumbling,
painted idols smashed and crumbling.

(first published by Poet’s Reading the News:   http://www.poetsreadingthenews.com/2017/12/all-around-the-men-are-tumbling-poetry-katherine-lo/)

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