December 17: Wake Up Daughter, Dance Lesson, "Onward Christian Soldier"

In a few minutes, I have to go wake up my daughter.  She has a dance lesson in about an hour.  I'm not really sure what kind of mood she's going to be in.  If she's already awake when I get home, it will be a good morning.  Easy.  If I have to enter the cave of her room, it will be like poking a hibernating grizzly.

I wrote a poem about poking the bear a while ago.  Just came up with a new title for it . . .

Onward Christian Soldier

by:  Martin Achatz


My daughter is angry with me,
Has stomped around all day,
Tears always near
The surface, Mississippi waters
After three days of rain,
Barely held in check
By piled sandbags.
I watch her in white robe,
Marching back-and-forth
Across the altar, lighting
Candles, arranging chalice,
Patin, cloths the way I
Slam dishes in the kitchen sink
When I lose my temper,
Hoping a plate or bowl
Shatters, makes me bleed.
I don't know what I've done
To drive her to such fury,
Whether I've ignored some
Unseen wound,
A cardiac contusion
On her heart caused
From a classmate,
Or a slow leak, an aneurysm
In her mind from something
I said weeks ago, a joke
About the boy who shows up
At our door every day,
Asks if my daughter can
Come out to play basketball
Or touch football, some sport
That involves much physical contact.
What I do know is this:
She storms around the front
Of church like a Roman centurion
On the prowl for a Christian
To martyr, not genuflecting
In front of the tabernacle,
Looking God straight in the eyes,
Daring Him to say anything,
Anything at all.


Please vote for Saint Marty:

Voting for Poet Laureate of the U. P.