J. Randal Matheny

If you've been a subscriber of the email list for long, you know I'm not a melancholy writer. Usually. Today's offering, then, strikes a more wistful tone than normal. Chalk it up to being home alone, with The Missus off with family.

So today you get imperfect rhyme in places. The second stanza could well serve as a refrain if somebody were minded to write music for it.

So here's the question for the list subscribers: Did the poem leave you feeling a bit sad? What note most caught your attention?

This piece is part of a work, Choose Love, that I hope to make into a second volume, following my book Choose!. Who knows if it will ever get finished. But perhaps you'll be uplifted by this installment.

Some have considered 1 Corinthians 13 as a parenthesis in the discussion about the use of gifts. In truth, it is the center and peak of the whole discussion, with the discussion in chapter 12 on gifts and chapter 14 on edification as the slopes of the peak. It all comes down to love. Or rather, it is up to love at the peak where we must climb.

Not everyone has the same gift. But every single saint must have the same motivation of love. Here, Paul personifies love. Some think he has the Lord Jesus Christ in mind. If so, he will move quickly from Jesus as love to the disciple as love. But perhaps he seeks to pass on the idea that wherever love is present, this is how it will act.

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The deluge of news in the world, via our constant connectedness to the Internet, depresses the soul with the perverseness and maliciousness of man. The disciple of Christ protects his mind. He guards his soul from corrupting influences. He keeps away from the negativity. While he engages the people of the world, he raises high barriers against its perspective.

So today's poem focuses on the things — shall we be more precise? — on the One from whom all good and righteousness flow.

The meter is unusual for me, seven feet, which connotes the crowded negative and twisted media that presses in upon us.

Three stanzas were written some days ago. The third, below, was added this morning.

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This poem was somewhat inspired by the big news of the last couple of days. Perhaps you can see tints of it in these two short stanzas.

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The old iambic pentameter and variations came in handy today, as I picked up a start of two lines made months back. From those two I sustained an AABB rhyme scheme. It finally resolved into 12 robust lines.

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This newest poem is a bit longer than usual, but not by much. A different rhyme scheme as well. A different sound to the topic.

Here are the first two stanzas, of seven.

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The background behind the three-stanza poem going to the email list today is, of course, the drubbing that the Brazil soccer team suffered on Tuesday at the hands of Germany in the World-Cup semi-finals.

Costa Rica lost a few days earlier, too, but I'm sure they went home with heads held high. Our team couldn't do that.

The poem is a simple one, an AABB rhyme scheme with four-foot meter. Doesn't get much simpler than that, nor does the truth it contains.

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Better too much a plan than little,
Actions overflow from thinking,
Finer plans give visions their mettle,
Clear details keep dreams from sinking.

—J. Randal Matheny

http://yourdaytoshine.com/

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Enjambment, rhyme, varied meter, a touch of alliteration, this poem doesn't have it all, but it's got a lot. And more stanzas than usual, six that move fast to the end. Just like life.

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