Adam Byrn Tritt's Blog, page 9

Revival

There is a woman preaching to the river. Standing on the sidewalk, next to the new blue Toyota, gospel music blaring from the car speakers and open doors, she holds her Bible high in the air yelling to the dolphins, the cranes, the pelicans, and any tree that may hear. Any flower that may be blooming. Anyone.

She is a revival of none with a tent of clouds, looking to redeem the river, an evangelist for the fish, witnessing to the water, which, already holy, laps at the shore, listening, leavi...

Don’t Touch the Lava

Tenth graders jump in the halls,
leap
from one sparse gray tile
to the next,
avoiding the vast field of
lava
that has magically appeared
during lunch.
White tiles burn.

I poke one in the back
as I walk by.
He staggers,
lurches forward,
touches lava,
screams and falls,
pretending to burn into nothing but
giggles.
Leapers, one by one,
stagger, fall, burn
as the whole corridor descends into
giggles.

High school.
Tenth grade.
They write code.
Build robots.
Judge science fairs and

they still play...

This Story

This garden is the story
Told and retold.
The good work,
After the thaw.
Of digging into it,
Thick and deep,
With both hands.
Dark and heavy
Dirt under the nails,
The stains of soil that speak
of productive labour.
Our blisters,
Backs,
Aching, though
We have dug here before
And will dig here again.
Again, the flowers will grow,
Blooms open to beauty,
Ebullience, awe,
Warm our hearts,
Blooms grow to fruit,
Leaf to vegetable,
Fill our stomachs,
Sate our hungers,
Our hopes of harvest not for
Not...

Can you title this poem for me?

Really. I need your help. I can’t title this poem. It caught me in the car, I had to pull over. I had to write.

Maybe it will be all I write about for the rest of my life. Maybe writing about it will let me write about other things. I don’t know. I think about it more than I should. More than is good for me.

Can you title this? Can you leave a title in the comments?

If you nail it, I’ll send you a book.

One day

Cancer came into my home.

It went though my filing cabinets,

It took my

Who, what, where,...

Merry Christmas

To all my Christian family, friends, and loved ones, Merry Christmas. May you bring and be brought love, peace, fellowship, understanding, goodwill, charity, empathy and harmony – all things taught and practiced by Jesus and I, personally, can’t think of a better example of how to treat the world and each other than Jesus.

For my non-Christian family, friends, and loved ones, I wish for you love, peace, fellowship, understanding, goodwill, charity, empathy and harmony.

For my Humanist family, f...

Skeleton Dance

Longhorns sound,

the dancers enter the stage.

I know them,

under the massive masks

and glorious dress,

but when they dance

they really are

Bull and Stag.

No longer people

they are horses,

spectral shades,

Power and Obsession.

The drums sound

and I close my eyes.

Through my tissue lids

flashbulbs become fireworks

become lightning flashes

before the thundering skins

and as the storm passes

I open my eyes to two dancers.

Soon they will be Monks again

with faces I recognize

and names I know

but now

They are two skeleton...

After She Dies

Everything is a first

after she dies—

The first breath

after the last heartbeat,

the first step away,

the first glance back.

The first fall of night and

the first turning down of the covers.

The first sleepless night,

the first full moon to light the vacant bed.

The first sunlight of the first dawn.

The first vacant stare at a broad new day.

The first time in a grocery store.

The first meal cooked.

The first laugh and the first guilt.

The first time back to work,

the first time sick,

the first time a docto...

Listen

Listen.

A year ago, maybe less, maybe more, at dinner, a discussion.

It was an evening designed for people to get to know each other. I desperately wanted it to go well. I don’t think it did.

One person talked while the other listened. One felt the other had no interest because she was not being asked questions. She felt asking questioning was how someone showed interest in another. The other person felt the first wasn’t listening because she was asking questions but not hearing the narrative, l...

Varieties of Religious Experience

A drive. Arlene next to me, my hand on her knee. On the radio, I have playing the overture from Jesus Christ Superstar. It has stopped raining.

We are driving south on US1, between Rockledge and Eau Gallie. One would think, from the names, these places would be much more interesting, more exotic than they are. Rock Ledge to Rocky Waters. US1 here is all a limestone ridge along the Indian River, a one hundred and twenty-one mile brackish sound, much of it shallow enough to walk across, separate...

Causeway

Causeway

(The first part romMiddle Englishcauceweye, either fromLatincalx,calcis(“limestone”), or alternatively from Latincalciāre(“to stamp with the heels, tread”), fromcalx(“heel”). The second corresponds to Englishway. Causeway: A raised road upon which to walk, made of stone, over a body of water.)

As we walked the causeway
Over the river,
to the beach,
“Can we stop?
I want to look out over the water,
Listen,
Watch the moon rise above and below.”
Easy.
Of course. I wish everything people as...