On An Ordinary Tuesday Poem by Daniel Brick

"Tell me something
I haven't heard before.
Poems about nature - "
My friend fell suddenly
silent. "Sorry, that wasn't
what I meant." I closed my folder
containing eight new poems -
about nature. I was ready for this.
"It's 8 am. Do you think
you'd say this at 8 pm? "
My friend looked puzzled.
"The day is young, and you
are waiting for its summons.
You're impatient to make
your mark, make your contribution.
I understand this: listening to poems
is an activity for day's end, not
its beginning." He looked relieved.
"That's what I meant to say, but words,
the right words, well, that's your skill,
not mine." I seized the dangling moment.
"Poetry is the way I make my mark on passing
time. No poem can stop time's relentless flow,
but at least it now carries something of us,
the mark of our being in its mad rush forward.
You see, that's what poems do, all poems.
What they mean varies, it's secondary anyway."
My friend looked puzzled again. "I never thought
of it that way, " he said slowly. "Well, you asked me
to tell you something you haven't heard before."
At that, we both laughed, and we both knew our talk
had reached a turning point. "You have an idea,
don't you? " I said. "Spill it." At that moment, my friend
smiled with resolution: he was ready for this.
"How often have we walked through our neighborhood,
their yards and walls blocking our contact with the people
inside? Who are they? What do they need, because everyone needs?
We can't just go up to their doors, ring the bell, and
when that stranger we've seen for years appears, we say -
What can we say? How can this not be rude, an intrusion? "
My friend fell silent: words were not his friends. They
betrayed him, saying too much or too little. And his silence
was his acceptance of defeat again and again. But not this time.
"You have something to propose, don't you? Don't let it
waste inside you. Speak it. I'm listening." His smile
of resolution reappeared. "I know we can't rescue the world
on our own, not even this neighborhood. But what if we put
everything in higher hands. I mean prayer, my friend. Let's
walk slowly and prayerfully passed all these houses. It will
become an offering, we will have done something, and the rest
rests with our Father." I was moved past words. Imagine that:
a poet moved past words! And so it went: our walking became
prayer, prayer became offering, and morning light was
Heaven's Grace spreading everywhere we stepped.