There are at least two Machuses in heaven. Malchus according to LUke has at least two ears but no name …

First leaves of trout lily among the roots of a bare beech tree …

Against the turnings of solstice hope sprouts eternal …

Wrapped and laid beginning and end bloth and cloth birth and death …

the phone rings–my grandmother’s voice winds through static, light as the creek curling around her back porch …

It’s about us which is an empathy pronoun, replacing her and him and you and it and, praise the Lord, other.

Seventy-seven pounds of wool on that merino sheep who got lost
in the Outback.

Let the sparrow take a chair at the Juneteenth table with Elijah …

You said, Let there be light, and there was light. And you saw that the light was good …

On the night he was supposed to be betrayed, Jesus strapped on a Glock under his cloak, just in case the breastplate of righteousness didn’t

Unnoticed except by their Maker, my wife and me–a dozen sparrows blissful at their ablutions …

We drove nails into His wrists, air reeking of animal remains and criminal bodies piled next to the horse trough …