ANOTHER ANNIVERSARY POEM
Writing in the pew,
after worship,
Bell Choir
practicing, each pew draped
with handmade quilts
sewn during the year,
Bart’s directing
choir,
an artist himself,
jazz pianist,
Karen is on the near
end
closest to where I
sit. Next Sunday
they will ring for
the congregation.
They’re
practicing, O Come, O Come,
Emmanuel. God
with us in the pew.
It’s my dad’s
middle name, never
used by him, but he
could sign the E
with a flourish.
Karen plays four bells
at the same time—G,
A, A flat, B flat.
They’re talking
back and forth now.
Bart is laughing. My
Notebook’s open, along
with Bonhoeffer’s,
Cost of Discipleship.
I’m three weeks
living with his work
on the Beatitudes.
I’ll never finish.
Blessed are the
merciful. [May I die,
right here, Lord?]
For they shall receive
mercy. Jesus
speaking to his disciples,
Bonhoeffer reminds
us. They have
renounced their own
dignity. Bonhoeffer's
27 years old writing
this. The same age
as Jimi* and Janis
when they died.
The year is 1933.
Bonhoeffer will be
hanged in 1945, at
the age of 39,
the same age as
Flannery O’Connor,
Martin Luther King,
Jr., and Malcolm.
It will be spring
right before Allied
Liberation. The day
will be the 9th
of April, sharing
the same day
as my mother’s
birthday. They’re
ringing again, the
bells, Rejoice!
Rejoice! Bell
ringers throwing
out the sounds with
their arms.
The disciples have
wed themselves
to the poor, the
stranger, and the wronged.
They wear the
clothes of shame
and dishonor. This
is the beatitude,
great gift, given to
me by my mother,
and I have passed it
on to my children
who have wrapped
others in mercy
for more than half a
century. It’s
too much. I imagine
my children
as bell ringers.
Cowering before
their courage, I
often find myself unable
to praise. I hear
them most clearly
in Cannonball
Adderley’s great
song, Mercy,
released in 1964,
written by Joe
Zawinul, Adderley’s
piano
player—Austrian, by the way,
who often had to
ride hidden
in the car driving
in the South
during Jim Crow
because everybody
but Ziwinul was
black. Mercy, mercy, mercy,
how Adderley
introduces the song. Often times
we’re not ready
for adversity, he says,
Zawinul playing in
the background.
Returning to hear
the song on Youtube
over the years, is
how I memorized
Adderley’s words,
and his speaking
voice, repeating,
Mercy, mercy, mercy.
Rhyme in adversity.
Its marriage to trouble.
One time at
Thanksgiving my sister drops
a bowl of olives,
crying, Oh mercy me.
A granddaughter asks
her why she said that.
She says, We laugh
so we don’t have
to cry, Baby. Mercy.
It’s the joke that hides
our treasure. The
way Jesus says, Price paid.
The way Karen rings
four bells.
*Jimi Hendrix and
Janis Joplin both died in 1970.
Jim Bodeen
24-25 November 2024
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