Monday Sabbath (a new poem)

Monday Sabbath

The preacher lives a Monday Sabbath
as the world rushes to the quotidian;
the city-bus groan, office politics,
classroom chaos, breakfast to go.

Resist the voice that insists on
Productivity!
Usefulness!
Preparedness!
Refuse the myth of indispensability,
lie that dies slowly,
deserving a quick burial,
oblivion.

Roll from bed into a day rife with
possibilities neither created nor
imagined – only to be received.

Pages of non-fiction delight and enliven –
Pastoureau’s “The Colour of our Memories.”
Tomato seedlings cry for planting, for
fresh air, for freedom to extend roots.
The camera begs to be taken up to capture
and be questioned by a living world.

Only see and hear and touch and receive.

The preacher lives a Monday Sabbath,
and suddenly knows whereof he speaks.