Creché
by: Billy Collins
For a moment,
the ox and a sheep
looked over at each other,
then they turned away
and went back
to adoring the Child.
It is difficult to maintain wonder for an extended period of time, even in the presence of the son of God. Ask the ox and sheep. Yes, there were angels singing, and, according to legend, talking doves and chickens (maybe) and a donkey (who probably just complained about how sore his hooves were after plodding across deserts and mountains). However, as I said, wonder is hard to sustain. It has a half life--eventually transmutating into awe and then surprise and then mild interest and then boredom.
Today, a total solar eclipse happened. Not where I was, but in parts of the country. My relatives in Detroit almost got totality, but some friends in Ohio experienced it all: first contact to second contact to totality and back. Me? I got about 82.4%. Still a pretty great show.
What amazed me most was the fact that everyone wasn't outside with proper eyewear to witness it. I was working at the library, and, while the sun was being gobbled up by the moon's shadow, there people sat at the public computers, playing solitaire and researching genealogy and God knows what else. All while one of the true miracles of the universe was happening above their heads. Even the ox and sheep in Collins' poem eventually turn back to the Child.
I try hard not to become immune to wonder. I've been married for almost 30 years to the same woman. We've been through a lot together, some of it incredible and some of it terrible. We are both human, and we both have made mistakes. A lot of them. Yet, we are still together and very much in love. That is cause for wonder. And we have two great kids who aren't meth addicts or sex workers or Republicans. Another cause for wonder.
I experienced something full of wonder this afternoon. The sun almost completely disappeared for a little while from the heavens. However, every day of my life, I experience something else full of wonder: love. As Bonnie Tyler sings--a total eclipse of the heart.
Here is a poem Saint Marty wrote last night in honor of today's wonder . . .
Reflections on a Good Life Before a Solar Eclipse
by: Martin Achatz
after Tracy K. Smith
The terrible thing about living
a good life is that you never
know you are living a good
life until it has become
memory, gilded in gold
leaf and bound in leather
on the bookshelf of the past.
Those newlywed days
when my wife waited
every morning for calls
from schools desperate
for warm bodies to fill
seats of missing teachers,
me writing after she left
until I had to report
to the book store where
I arranged porn mags,
recommended poetry
by Sharon Olds and sold
copies of John Grisham's
latest legal masterpiece,
those were good days,
and when enough good days
are strung together, they become
a good life where, at night,
we pulled out the futon,
got naked, covered ourselves
with a quilt, ate Oreos
as we read novels or watched
Seinfeld and laughed until
we were weak in each other's
arms. Some nights, we slept
there, not bothering to stumble
to the bedroom, and we would
kiss and touch each other
until my body eclipsed hers
or her body eclipsed mine,
and we basked in the totality
of each other.
What a wonder- full poem! Thank you! Christine
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