Psalm 1

Psalm 1, another spoken piece, is inspired (as should be obvious) by the image of the righteous person as a tree "planted by streams of water" (Ps 1:3). The memories in this poetic response to the psalm are from what I recall as my first childlike impression of a day that I hoped, and even felt, would never end: a long summer day in June when the neighborhood kids were playing sardines, and the gang ended up silently perched in the late twilight in the willow tree in our side yard. The tree was a wispy thing that did indeed reach and brush up against the wall outside the bedroom window. The poem is more literal than psychological, so don't read too much into such phrases as, you know, "June's dusky longing."

Here's the text, this one also included in The Just Quiet Wind.

I remember a willow tree

A great climbing tree with

Powerful roots dancing

Branches

Supple, strong, cradling 

Eleven children giggling and

One lost and searching

In the late light of June’s

Dusky longing

I remember a bruised sky

Silhouettes infiltrating the disappearing green

Shadows weeping

That willow held our world 

Aloft, the last support

The stalwart mast of sinking day

I remember that willow

By the streams of life

On which we made our beds

One thousand nightfingers

Kissing summer bedroom walls 

As we slept

On our river of dreams ...

Tarentum, PA;  June 16, 1997

The guitar riff is one I have used in worship on other occasions to accompany a scripture reading. As long as the reader is trained to pause at particular, well chosen junctures, it can be used to meditative and evocative effect in conjunction with any number of readings.