Try to find Her

With all this jibber-jabber about gender,

'tis a conundrum for any attentive community to render

a consensus about who is who and what is what

and whether to swing bathroom door open or shut,

and wondering whether she's a girl and he's a boy,

and whether we can use reproductive assets as a toy,

as if genitalia are some useless endowment to be cast aside

like an appendix or a gall bladder, thus neuterizing gonad pride.

But this ole boy was reading in a bible a little while ago,

which is, I understand, a dubious activity if I must say so

because many think that ole book aint hardly worth a dime

because those folks therein were livin' so far back in time

before there was internet and social media and trash TV

and folks was so bound up in ignorance and primitivity.

And you probably think you know what I'm about to say

about what adam and eve did on that fateful day.



But really I was a-ponderin' about something other than that--

the teachings of a man who as an ancient king had been begat.

Of Wisdom, he wrote: "She will honor you if you embrace her,"

as if there's something feminine about wisdom that we should infer.

So, if wisdom is so honorable, as Solomon presents it to be,

why did such a royal chauvinist call wisdom a "her" instead of a "he"?

For such a misogynistic polygamist king to so advise--

why, he had no business issuing such a sexist proverb to the wise:



"Take hold of instruction; do not let her go. Guard her, for she is your life."

But everybody knows this utterance, by modern standards, is just rife

with chauvinistic, sublimated predatory sexist implication

as if the lusty old king would entrap Wisdom for a coital conjugation.

But really, ole Solomon was like any decent, honorable man

who puts his lady and her wisdom on a pedestal stand.

So it's good that Wisdom is associated with the Womanly side,

so that Man can proliferate in his brawny, line-of-scrimmage pride.



And this has been going on for a long, long time, y'all.



Glass Chimera

Afterglow

One man, one woman

become one.

Host of family and friends

from near and far

gather.

Joy, celebration, love;

heaven comes down

to us

while we witness,

in bright sunshine,

nature's original intent

for him and her. . .

sacramental coupling more

mysterious and sweet than

we could have anticipated, so that the

coital coupling to come will conceive pure

love.

A miracle of unity, this event transforms

all who are present and willing

to enter into their sacred intent toward each other,

in faithfulness, fidelity, finality.

Rare, but true.



John speaks of love and sacrifice, while

celestial grace streams from

blue sky.

Wisdom gets multiplied by two, and

Joy

far greater than we could have mustered,

erupts from the fearless conviction of their vows,

spoken boldly, with certainty, and yet lit up

around the edges, like this entire celebration itself,

with a slightly naughty mirth.

Such brave intent we see, in spite of the dissolution of all things holy that's

going on out there in, you know. . .

the world, and all that other crap we hear about from time to time.

But now. . .

Their vowful miracle becomes

a blessing to us who witness, even

as they speak the gift into existence, pronouncing to

each other.



And then they skip away.

And so amazed are we

while we wonder at the the scene. We

had wandered in; now we float

out, in sacramental awe.

We eat, drink, dance, celebrate into the night until. . .

as suddenly as they had entered in,

bride and groom are gone.

To discover the greatest mysteries of life.

This Afterglow

bequeaths us traces of infinite, unpredictable

fulfillment,

with glintings of eternal grace.

This moment, remembered, shall inspire us

to consecrate today's exchange, while

these two young ones are continually equipped,

in time,

to become one.

They'll discover, as days and nights ripen,

that pleasure which is, in all of life, the most precious of all:

to behold, as days slip into years, that smile on the face

of the one you love.

They'll come to savor it, like the finest wine, as Mom and Dad have,

and their Mom and Dad before them.

That unfathomable depth of joy will fortify

the life they share with invincible companionship.

While meanwhile, back at the ranch, parents bask in

afterglow.