LATE JANUARY MORNING PRAYER

 

LATE JANUARY MORNING PRAYER

                         for K. M. And Martin Luther King, Jr.

We pray this morning for the clergy

on the streets of Minneapolis,

            and we pray for all on the streets

            all over the world.

We pray for the monks

praying for us,

                       and we pray, in particular,

                       for our own ELCA Lutheran clergy

          on the streets

                                in Minneapolis

                                and St. Paul,

                       and in pulpits all over the world.

We pray for all of of them,

                                           whether they are in the pulpit

                       or on the street.

We honk and wave.

We pray for them whether or not

                        they speak or       remain silent.

We pray, too, for those who have gone before us,

living and in your all-grace-filled arms, O Lord,

those saints, teaching us to love,

who rid our prayers of poison, Fr. Stanley Marrow, S.J.,

Brother David-Steindl-Rast, Father Merton,

Teresa of Avila, John of the Cross, Father Rohr,

including your blessed tattooed one, Father Boyle,

and the catalogue of many others.

We pray, too, for our clergy in Yakima, all of them,

O Lord, hear our prayer.

Jim Bodeen

24 January 2026

PECAN PIE FOR MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR--2026

 

                                            PECAN PIE FOR MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.--

MARTIN LUTHER KING DAY, 2026

Part One: Invitation to the Party

We’re having Pecan Pie for your birthday,

Reverend King. We’ll be in the narthex

at Central Lutheran Church, Yakima.

Today is Monday, a baking day,

your sermons on the kitchen counter,

and Letter from Birmingham Jail.

I’m listening to Precious Lord

right now—Right now! Time is fluid,

and the pies, well—I was following

hearsay when I heard Pecan

was your favorite pie—they’re

out of the oven—two deep dish

large ones, butter and lard, toasted

pecans, honey and eggs, two smaller ones

for children. pie plates with smiling faces

—pies for kids during Sunday School--

like you say, Use time creatively--

and following up on your instructions

to Ben Branch, at the Lorraine Motel--

Play that song tonight at the meeting, Ben.

There’s more pie, than that, Dr. King.

Karen showed me how to bake Tassie’s--

bite-sized, and lots of them--

by the dozens. We’re going to lift

everybody up with your words--

you voice too—baked into those pies.

Thank God for your voice!

We’re lifting you, too, Reverend King,

we need you more than you need us,

I know, I know. I’m reaching towards

that long arc you helped us with,

we’re in trouble again, but before

I get there, I need some help from that song.

Stop me in my ramble. Who’s your favorite

to sing that song? Mahalia’s a first guess,

but Marion Williams? Aretha sang it

at 14—but you know what, I probably

learned it from Jim Reeves as a boy

in North Dakota. I played it

in the living room on trombone

for my Dad. I began living it then,

in 1955, and then with Elvis. None

of my family knew Thomas Dorsey.

Help me, Dr. King, to get to

where it’s hurting now. Aretha

sang it at your funeral. That’s

where I go first and always.

I can see I’m going in circles,

I want to talk about 1968—2026, too!--

how we suffer before we get real.

I still listen to Elvis. And this song

that cleans up my tears rolling out pies.

Jim Bodeen

13 January 2026

LINES FOR REX ON THE DAY OF HIS MOTHER'S FUNERAL

 

LINES FOR REX ON THE DAY OF HIS MOTHER’S FUNERAL

                        P.S. Before the poem: Love to you and Terri, Rex.

                        Christ Love reaching us today in Yakima. Thanks. Jim

Looking for a book of poems

your mother would like to find

on the coffee table, Rex.

Patricia Smith’s deep search

for voices never heard—Smith

found discarded faces

in 19^th Century photographs

and resurrected the people.

She wrote the poems.

Unshuttered what was shuttered.

I think your Mom would approve,

seeing them Sunday dressed

at their best in your living room,

listening to their stories

after Wednesday Prayer meeting

at Holy Temple. Looking for more

than your Mom’s approval--

but looking for that, too,

Mrs. Hazel B. DeLoney’s

story, formidable, goes before her,

from 1931, 94 years,

elder, supervisor,

goes before, and with, ...but

there’s so much more—your

sweet mother’s wide arms

can reach those unshuttered faces

knowing their clothes, knowing

where Patricia Smith’s poems hit home.

Your mother knows her son,

knows all her children, and knowing

her son—you, Rex—perhaps even

your Mom takes a step back in wonder

seeing how faces in your paintings

keep us alive, vital, going forward.

Jim Bodeen

20 December 2025

NOTE TO TOM GARRISON REMEMBERING

NOTE TO TOM GARRISON REMEMBERING KAREN

We were young, and we were the Davis Idea.

You and Karen are in so many places besides the classroom.

You were Math and Home Ec teachers.

You were on the field and in the booth.

You were Tom and Karen and Greg

and here you are in the Lolomi a family

while being one. These old photos

from the yearbook. Greg on drums,

home now for you, for Karen.

We were young and you are the Davis Idea,

why we gather in the Cafeteria to remember Karen,

remembering how this came to be

taking on a life of its own, how

it became a different thing

than what people think about

when they think about school,

and if they don’t think family

they won’t get it. Remembering

Karen is partly all those superior ribbons

of drill team—I know there were nine years

in a row, that’s documented—Karen

was the first principle of the Davis Family.

You showed us how to open the computer.

This is a drum roll, and Greg is on drums.

Love from us all, Jim, Karen and all of the Bodeens

crossing decades of the Davis High School experience.

Jim

22 November 2025

DRAGONFLIES ON YOUR 18TH BIRTHDAY

 

DRAGONFLIES ON YOUR 18TH BIRTHDAY,

Deanna. Yes. Dragonflies.

Spirit wings, carved into silver

from native Lakota traditions.

This is the ceremony of the coins

from Grandpa on your 18^th birthday.

A spirit dollar. What might

you look at first? Oh, no.

Forget the question. Go

to the fly, its wings,

that if they flutter once,

they’ll be gone, rare

as they are, and secure,

rare and gone,

into the beautiful

fly away.

Gpa

27 December 2025

P.S. Gma and I love you so much. Jb

P.S. Some background information on the coin from the Lakota

Sioux culture. Dragonflies represent change, healing, spirit

connection and living life fully. This coin is part of the

Native American Spirit series. Only 2,500 coins in existence.

The wings are Antique, metallic, iridescent.

8-point star on back with 8 feathers. Gpa

ANOTHER AND ANOTHER READING--BLUE BABY

 

ANOTHER AND ANOTHER READING

OF MARY JO SALTER’S POEM BLUE BABY

IN THE NEW YORKER, ANOTHER AND ANOTHER READING

                               --Darrell Sagness 1944-1955

                               --David Schweizer 1950-2024

I.

Yes, yes, no, no. But this can’t be.

But the years almost right. Dee Dee

and I--born in the same

North Dakota town--he

lived and then he didn’t, and now,

well, here he is with David Schweizer.

I’m sitting in the pew, sixth row,

early Sunday, Mary Jo Salter, listening

to Bell Choir practice, my wife Karen,

ringing, with Ruth Ann’s cello, carrying

your Blue Baby, pages torn

out of New Yorker, December 8, 2025--

Yakima, Washington, decades

from Bowbells, North Dakota, still

Lutheran, dry land farm country,

NW corner, top soil covering

oil distilled from shallow seas.

I don’t know where you are this morning,

Mary Jo Salter, but strangely, you are

in the pew, present, your poem a part of me.

II.

Darrell, we called him Dee Dee,

Sagness lived on the farm outside of town

and I was a town boy, and my father

managed the Great Northern Grain

elevator, where his parents brought

their wheat. We were playmates,

and Darrell was a Blue Baby

and that’s how we knew him

playing marbles in front of school,

choosing sides for baseball out back.

Swinging wildly, choosing Darrell first,

choosing Darrell last, never

able to get it right, Blue Baby.

Something of his blueness in our selves.

III.

Blue Baby. Hole in the heart.

For the first time, Dee Dee

would run with the rest of us,

no longer blue, and fast. He would

hit, and we wouldn’t wonder

if he’d be chosen. And the operation

worked. Doctors in Minneapolis

opened his heart, stopped up the hole

where blood spilled into his face

and arms and legs. He came back

to us, and none of us were blue.

His mom called my mother,

Could Jimmy spend a day

on the farm with Darrell,

and the boys would have

the whole day to play.

IV.

And then he died. Just like that.

His heart wore out, they said.

After all the work it had to do

while he lived. This isn’t

the first time I’ve talked about

Darrell, Mary Jo. Your poem is salve.

Dee Dee and I sang in the Junior Choir.

We lived across from the church

rent free in the house owned

by the Great Northern Railroad.

Choir boys would be pall bearers

with his body. At practice,

laughter broke out from my body

stopping the hymn. Guffaws

bursting. I couldn’t stop

giggling. Dee Dee’s

heart stopped, and I couldn’t

stop laughing. I was ashamed.

We wore white robes and God gave me

buckets of tears, relieving

my terror. Like I’d been saved.

That day at his farm we sat

on the steel seat of the old tractor

and ate our sandwiches and laughed.

V.

There are tears in your poem, too,

Mary Jo. Thank you for Caleb’s

walking to the pulpit. Thank you

for the glimpses of Schweizer’s childhood

reading long books in bed,

for the saving qualities of costumes.

There would be an acting director

in my life, too, showing me how

to enter a room when I came back

from Vietnam. I would learn how

to wear a hat, how to dress

North Dakota as Louis Seize

without causing a fuss.

For your Blue Baby shows

how magnificent a heart might be,

how manly and flamboyant,

how the beating heart changes

the music and how bells ring.

Jim Bodeen

10 December 2025

EXPANSIVE LOVE [PARTS I & II]

 

EXPANSIVE LOVE [part one]

        [On the Retirement of the Office Ministry of Lea Ramirez]

                                                                                 (with no h)

My daughter Leah (with an h

in her name) like you,

danced on drill team

and you have a way

of knowing these things.

And so we’ve crossed

this half century of knowing

each other. Joe Lenberg

brought you here, to this

church office, this ministry.

Like Felicity, he knew some things.

What life gave you here:

grandchildren, great grandchildren.

And how does one call the great losses, gifts?

Son, husband, mother. Rudy!

How you loved Marcia.

The way you wear

your red cowboy boots

lifts up widows.

Your advocacy heels.

The fourteen pastors

of your tenure: Scheid,

Nelson, Martyn, Stewart,

Nesvig, Hellerich, Lambertson

Abiut, Anderson, Murphy,

Klepach, three from Tree of Life,

Hilde, Moses. Count the other

ministers, too, Felicity, Denise,

the musicians: Virginia and Bart,

the choirs and the bells. Count

Flushing toilets during Covid

to avoid rings in the bowls, how

you know things. Fierce loyalty.

These are Kathleen’s fingers

on the piano playing

Bridge Over Troubled Water.

This is joy as you, Lea Ramirez,

become joy entering a room--

how you know things, not depending

on what happens, and doing the work.

EXPANSIVE LOVE [part two]

The pastor’s secretary is retiring.

The pastor’s secretary.

She’s worked for 14 pastors.

I’ve got the list right here.

The pastor’s secretary, we say,

repeating ourselves, 14 pastors,

all those years. All those pastors.

What she must know

about them, the ones who

had to minister to us.

Imagine ministering to 14 pastors,

and knowing, too, as Lea knew,

that’s only part of your work.

Grace surrounds her in being Lea.

She knows grace as God’s work. The rest

of it, the bulk of her ministry,

also grace-filled, is taking care of,

and loving, us.

Jim Bodeen

1 December 2025

Thank you, Sister Lea,

for all of it, Jim