I want a new Ted Lasso now

 

serial consciousness

stories are us,

we love the word,

and we love the words

that tell us tales

of who we are

from the past to our present,

tales of who others are in lives

that parallel ours,

that diverge from ours,

that grab our interest

in roads not taken,

in roads that might be taken,

in roads that should not be taken,

summer in the mountains for me as a kid

had far fewer stories than I wanted,

the few books on the shelves read, and reread,

no television, few movies,

I remember Saturday morning movies and serials,

continuing stories we got as a chapter at a time,

now I have more books in hand or in Kindle than I can get to,

and, particularly daunting, a plethora of streaming stories,

far more high quality possibilities than I can handle,

I have story after story in my consciousness,

so many started but waiting for the next chapters to come out,

I feel addicted to countless soap operas,

with whom I can dance when the way opens for each,

I wonder how many serials I can handle?

Foundation stretches over a decade before me,

I want a new Ted Lasso now.

by Henry H. Walker

January 28, ’22

culled

 

a poem calls to me

order calls to me,

a drive to cull from experience and consideration

something of words that can hold

something of the thoughts and feelings

that course through me,

to let them eddy just long enough

to pull themselves into a shape I can note and record,

I am pulled inexorably downstream,

I love to find a rock,

to hold on for awhile,

and find the words that capture a bit 

of where I am, of who I am,

of what I can notice, appreciate, express,

I craft a poem,

and I feel the rightness of noticing,

and chronicling, a moment,

I feel a divine unease

until I find the words I need.

by Henry H. Walker

January  25, ‘22

what battles we fight

 our surface, our depths

as long as we’re on the surface,

we can imagine that the order before us

also reaches deep and that all is “fine,”

when asked “how are you?”

I can reply “fine” or “I’m good,”

or I can judge that the questioner

is ready for a fuller answer,

and how much fuller I judge on the fly,

I look at another,

and I can imagine the battles

that the other is fighting 

that I know nothing about,

our lives are full of effort,

and I can feel wonder at how well

the other moves across the slick surface

of work, of family,

of keeping the balls we see in the air,

and then I wonder what is going on

underneath what I can see,

how much effort it takes to stay

both on the surface we readily share with others,

and within the depths where fear, and doubt, and love,

pull us into the hardest struggles

that is who we are at our deepest,

and now privacy trumps inquiries,

the pandemic denying us easy access

to what is going on with a colleague or a student

when they are not here and maybe fighting battles

vital to them, but hidden from us,

great wrenching sobs call to me

when I can let myself deal with my own battles

that I often deny, repress, avoid noticing,

the depths call us,

the surface calls us,

and we prefer the surface.

by Henry H. Walker

January  25, ‘22

an amazing teacher!

 Leon Ikenberry

Linda Lou to Leon,

Miss Linesville to Math Goddess,

the snowy North to the sun of Bald Head Island,

Darryls to Carolina Friends School,

Greenawalt to Galloway to Ikenberry,

for decades a champion of every kid she learned to know,

a champion of the best within them,

a best she could not allow to be denied

by a teacher, by a class,

or to be denied by a kid choosing the wrong path,

the way forward, the way to get over the wall,

an imperative that she would not brook being denied,

enter a young person into her class, into her advisee group,

and they knew she saw them, knew them, appreciated them,

and she would not tolerate their slackness when they knew better,

she loved them unconditionally,

but there were always conditions to what effort she could accept,

her students always knew she was there for them,

and so they were determined to be there for themselves,

“no one cares how much you know

until they know how much you care,”

every young person has always known how much she cared,

and each did their best to prove her belief in them was right,

though it is time for her to move on from Carolina Friends School,

may we never believe any less in our students

than with the totality of love Leon has given every moment of every day

to the students who have been graced with her presence.

by Henry H. Walker

January 19, ‘22

the collective will, revealed?

 clerking

in Quaker pedagogy,

the “clerk” is a powerful concept,

a position that is antithetical

to the self as individual will,

asserting itself on the world,

rather a clerk, at its best,

should be the self as collective will

finding its voice,

Friends believe that the Divine expresses itself all the time,

that our challenge is to hear it, to listen to it,

to give ourselves to the revelation that struggles to be realized,

rarely does the revelation come to us full-blown,

like Athena from the head of Zeus,

instead, what is out there is only glimpsed,

maybe only by some of us at first,

the clerk needs to focus the group on what is being revealed,

so that collectively our limited perspectives can add together,

the elephant then might reveal itself,

a clerk can lead,

but everyone in the meeting must follow only

if the shape revealing itself makes sense to each open heart,

a clerk succeeds only 

if the group succeeds 

in finding the way forward.

by Henry H. Walker

January 12, ‘22

how are you doing? an answer

 

our viral load

when asked

“How are you doing?”

I often stammer, equivocate,

my best summary?

“Personally I’m doing well.

Empathically I am hurting.”

too many I know are hurting,

too many I don’t know must also be hurting,

today I ventured another phrasing:

“I teeter between Pollyanna and paranoia.”

my default is the optimist,

yet fear and despair are close to my surface,

truths that my subconscious notices 

and expresses in the deep night,

viruses aren’t even alive,

according to the restrictive definition we now use,

yet these unwelcome hitchhikers glitch our systems,

as if we are but marionettes dancing

to their tugs on our lines.

by Henry H. Walker

January 7 ‘22

family, letting go and holding

 

dispersal and return

family, at its best,

is of both dispersal and return,

parenting, like teaching, is whole-hearted commitment

to what is best for those within our world,

too close a hold, though,

and the bird doesn’t learn how to fly,

the familiar becomes the comfortable,

and the comfortable can make us not take risks,

we do not become as fully open

to risk, to growth, to the other

who challenges us to get out there,

and find out who others are,

so that we can more fully find out who we are,

our sons have left the South

to put down roots in the upper Mid-West and in New England,

their kids are hard at work discovering who they are

and who they can be,

I love reuniting with them,

so that they can know some of their roots,

and that we can know some of the branches they build

to flower and fruit under the same sun

but in different soil, enriched by other pasts,

and futures the questing tendrils of their newing selves

will find and follow,

the dispersal is vital, the return to the source is vital, too.

by Henry H. Walker

December 26, ‘21

the greatest of these

 

the centrality of love

nothing matters but love,

we need to feel how alone and lacking purpose existence is,

until our hearts reach out to care for another,

for their well-being to be even more important to us than our own,

for our well-being is inextricably linked to theirs,

we describe God as lonely

within a universe God created,

and God needed the other to feel complete,

I just wrote of caregivers who love unconditionally,

and give their selves in service to others,

in my connection with my wife,

with my children, with my grandchildren, with my students,

I make meaning with my life,

I learn who I am as I learn who we are,

“Faith, hope, love abide, these three,

but the greatest of these is love.” (1 Corinthians 13:13)

by Henry H. Walker

December 12, ‘21

truly seeing another

 

seeing the self

nobody really knows another person,

in fact, nobody really knows themselves,

yet who we are can be glimpsed,

can be seen just a bit,

and thus known, a bit,

that glimpse can matter deeply to us,

an affirmation that who we are has value,

more than the humdrum of mediocrity

that our self-doubt shows us

in the critical mirror we use, and fear,

I work hard to see a student, a friend, a family member,

and I often feel awe at who I can see,

and far more awe at who I know

must be there behind the curtains,

humans are not supposed to be strong enough to see God and survive,

I wonder how much we can truly see another, or ourselves,

without being undone by the power released.

by Henry H. Walker

December 29, ‘21

where I can meditate

 from my promontory

I leave a chair

up in the woods above the cabin,

it sits on a wooded promontory,

right above where the creek turns and drops,

I regularly meditate there,

concentrating on ancient truths embodied in words,

while my eyes open my present soul to revelation,

as the year turns,

bare branches bud forth into leaves,

humidity and heat settle on the tiered green world around me,

besides squirrels and chipmunks and small birds,

the most common animals to pass nearby are wild turkey,

they like to cross the creek just upstream,

sometimes flying down from roosting in tall hemlock,

once a heron alighted just above me,

as it enjoyed a foray up the creek

in search of small fish and crayfish,

I am alert to what’s different,

and I seek to hold a world centered

by my being fully present in it.

by Henry H. Walker

December 26, ‘21