Every Day Poems posted this photograph as a prompt on their facebook page.

Blindsided
by Joel E. Jacobson

It’s when I’m already running late
that I hit every light red,
that I get stuck behind
the only guy in the state
whose 10-under-the-speed-limit-
bumper-sticker message to me
is that I need to celebrate world peas,
Darwin fish eats Jesus fish,
I should wish for coexistence–

by the way
that irony
is not funny
to me
today–

My one, true desire
is for you to get a flat tire,
pull over, and suffer
for your rush-hour sins
of being a hindrance.

Full of haste, I jerk the wheel
to fly around the hippy imbecile
when I hear the honk and squeal
and swerve back into my place in line.

My heart pounds like my mind did
moments before being blindsided
by the slap of flapping wings
in the face of judgement.

For anyone who speaks in a tongue does not speak to people but to God. Indeed, no one understands them; they utter mysteries by the Spirit. But the one who prophesies speaks to people for their strengthening, encouraging and comfort.

I Corinthians 14:2-3 (NIV)

The “gift of tongues” is often a controversial topic in church circles. There are some churches that welcome the “gift” while others firmly teach that the “gift” no longer has a place in the modern corporate worship experience. I’ve never had the urge to blurt something in a language I’ve never learned, but have been around people who are quite thrilled to utter mumbo jumbo. I’m okay calling it mumbo jumbo, because the people I’ve heard have said that to speak in tongues, you just make up noises to praise God. A few of these people have actually told me that people are only truly saved if they speak in tongues. Forgive me for sounding skeptical, but there is so much screwed up theology that is suggested in these assertions that I refuse to give them any credit. Isn’t my salvation between me and God anyways? I’m pretty sure Jesus never said, “Believe in me and you will know a language that no other human can understand. Speak that language, and you will be saved.” The great irony here is that Jesus taught to believe in him and speak the language of love. People may not understand why they are being loved, or how to receive that love, but the language itself is clear.

I don’t want to rant to the point of losing my intent on writing about tongues in the first place. The thought struck me several weeks ago that there is a correlation between the intent of tongues and literature, especially poetry.

All poetics and schools aside, poetry is one of the core expressions of humanity. It was the first literature, the first drama. How many young writers turn to poetry when they are simply trying to find meaning in their experiences? I wonder if poetry is a (the?) lingual connection between man’s spirit and God’s.

If you read the full chapter of I Corinthians 14, you’ll notice that the use of tongues in corporate worship is only permissible when the words are interpreted. Otherwise, the words don’t mean anything for the greater congregation. Paul asserts that worshipers prophecy, or tell about their experiences and what God is doing in their lives, rather then speak in tongues and be selfish about the experience.

Could literature, or poetry for that matter, be the new tongues?

Looking at this chapter (I Corinthians 14) through a poetic lens, one could say that language is between man and God, but experience holds meaning between humans. Have you ever written a poem that held great power to you, only to have a reader say, “Huh?” With poetry, we have the intersection of “tongues” and “prophecy”, or of personal language and experience.

How often do we hold on to those inaccessible poems (outside of T.S. Eliot’s The Wasteland), those poems/stories that hold no meaning for the reader? I certainly don’t.

And how often do we have an opinion about a poem, and then, through the course of conversation (interpretation), our views are either solidified or broadened? I don’t think literature demands critics, but the understanding and overall joy can be maximized with insight outside my own.

___

the jibberish
of intersecting
my mind’s eye
and ear and tongue
sifts like fine dirt
through a sluice box

Salamander Cove is featuring three of my poems this month. Other notable poets that have been featured at Salamander Cover are Joseph Hutchison, Bill Knott, Rae Armentrout, and former US Poet Laureate Kay Ryan. I’m honored to be in such company! (Bill Knott has the majority of poems in this selection, and they are really worth reading. Fantastic work!)

I am honored to have another poem published by Catapult Magazine. Click to read “On the Shore of the Jordan River“.

As a side note, this chapbook is not copyrighted, but rather it is released under a Creative Commons license, which means you, the reader, have the freedom to use these poems to inspire your own creative work, whether it be musical, visual, or another poem. The only requirement is to credit the original author. Isn’t that what art is about–sharing and creating rather than hording?

Originally published in 1923, Spring and All, Williams’s manifesto of imagination and poetry, became one of, if not the most, influential works for mid to late twentieth-century poets. Produced on the heels of the Great War, Williams calls for new forms, new images, new beings, and new cultures because all previous forms and ideas had led us into destruction and death. Today, we again find our American selves faced with war and economic and food crises. In a country where politicians are calling for thousands of math and science teachers, where standardized tests and business skills trump imagination and art, Williams’s monumental work yet again stands at the threshold of form and tradition, begging for a savior.

Read the entire review here. Don’t forget to share your thoughts–is it too much to associate imagination and creativity with Jesus?

When Fantine falls
into the snow, incapable
of making herself
worthy of even the poorest
men, we pity her,
beg her not to sell
her teeth; then
we practically
kiss the feet
of Val Jean
when he swoops in
and snatches her
from the claws
of Javert.

When the harlot
falls before Jesus,
wipes away
the city muck
with her face,
we’ve already
judged and locked
her out–
and we already know
that Jesus
will forgive her
if we’ve been
reading along.

What we don’t know,
sitting at the dinner table
in awkward, interrupted
silence, is the aroma
of forgiveness, wafting
about her empty,
alabaster jar.

___

This is the final installment of the Storytellers project. Keep your eye out for the chapbook this fall!

by Joel E. Jacobson

“When a woman has a discharge of blood for many days at a time other than her monthly period or has a discharge that continues beyond her period, she will be unclean as long as she has the discharge, just as in the days of her period.” Leviticus 15:25

“She came up behind him and touched the edge of his cloak, and immediately her bleeding stopped.” Luke 8:44

“While Jesus was still speaking, someone came from the house of Jairus, the synagogue leader. ‘Your daughter is dead,’ he said. ‘Don’t bother the teacher anymore.’ Luke 8:49

In stopping to ask,
“Who touched me?”
a woman is healed,
a girl dies–
and both had faith.
I would easily
rush to the street
and beg for Jesus
to heal my dying child;
I would slice
through the crowd
just to brush up
against his cloak
and be okay
getting struck
by lightning
because either way
the bleeding stops.
But my prayers
would have ceased
years and years ago,
died with the hearts of men
who made sure to mention
all that was unclean,
all that was me.

In the face of laughter
Jesus heals the dead
and bleeding, though
I’ve only seen them
die. Determined
to win out
and be healed–
I’ve seen the faithful
bleed–embalmed
and buried with the rest.

Me of little faith,
stuck in the middle
of the story,
the middle of the crowd
pressing in
on a busy Jesus.

___

“In Stopping” is part 9 of the Storytellers project.

As I sat in my paddle boat in the middle of Grand Lake, my family bobbing happily along, I thought momentarily about cultivation. In Genesis, God commands man to take care of the land. Even now, the land still needs our help to be healthy. Nature is equally destructive towards itself as we are, something Emerson failed to acknowledge in his Transcendentalism utopia. Our earth has the ability to restore itself, and we see it as destruction. But forest are healthier when we remove the dead wood. Various animal herds are healthier when they aren’t over-populated. There’s something to be said for intentionally nurturing, cultivating, and caring for our home. The beetle tree problem is just another example of how our world needs us as much as we need it.

And the same goes for creativity. Our natural inclination is to move towards contentment, be okay with where we are. There’s a time for that, but if we, as artists or as people, ever buy into the lie that we have arrived, that we are the ultimate in our field, the moment the beetle begins to eat away at our creative spirit. The same applies if our audience becomes more important than our actual writing, or if success and the American Dream supersedes our art. I don’t say this to suggest that we should ignore our audience. Readers are part of the process, and alienating them doesn’t really help anything. Keeping an audience in mind is different than making the audience more important than the art.

What are some things that you do to stay fresh? To nurture your creativity? To refocus on the art instead status?