Cupworthy (WC)

 

(November 15, 2022, feast day of the (above) Kupyatich Icon of the Mother of God, the Fragrant Flower Icon of the Mother of God, and of Saint Paisios Velichkovsky, Blessed Lucy of Narni (inspired Lucy of Narnia?), and Blessed Helene-Marie Philippine. Image from Joseph MacRae.)

Cupworthy

(a shout out)

Morning wakens, heartened with synchronicity.

Morning’s Scripture at Mass:

I know your works;

I know that you are neither cold nor hot.

I wish you were either cold or hot.

So, because you are lukewarm, neither hot nor cold,

I will spit you out of my mouth.

–Revelation 3: 15, 16

 

Morning's poetry at class: 

Surely there's something better to do, though, than to drink a cup of

instant coffee. Such as meditate? About what? About having a cup of

coffee. A cup of coffee whose first drink is too hot and whose last drink

is too cool, but whose many in-between drinks are, like Baby Bear's porridge,

just right.

–Ron Padgett, “Prose Poem (‘The morning coffee.’)

Wait a minute, the parallel is contrast. Or perhaps not. Synchronicity is, what…reframing? Not renaming this yet, or anything yet, haven't even had my tea. 

An hour later now, fortified. Later still, my Joseph will step in from daily garden rounds, “Might be the last snap-dragon of the season” offered in palm. And I’ll say, “Guess what’s the feast day today? The “Fragrant Flower” Icon Mother of God!” But right now he’s still sleeping. And I’m still pondering this coffee-tea thing. And wakened, he’d likely mourn the fading coffee hour. No longer has his buddy table at McDonald's. Left with stories (earth she knows the scent of history*), like when out at Thorne Bay, Alaska, '94. Younger crew members take their filled coffee cups back to rooms--

“Coffee’s a personal thing”. 

Joseph disagreeing, a buddy joining, on their off time they pick up a percolator in town, nestle in at kitchen table—offer place to all as they enter. Heads shake, head back to their rooms. 

 

“Why is it

no one does coffee anymore?”,

Joseph says. 

*Quote is an adaptation of “Because the earth knows/The scent of history,/It gave the people sage.”, from “The Tea and Sage Poem” by Fady Joudah.

**From combined prompts: Freewrite as inspired by “Prose Poem (‘The morning coffee.’) by Ron Padgett, and by  “The Tea and Sage Poem” by Fady Joudah; from Lisa Freedman’s BreatheReadWrite Three’s a Charm series, November 12, 2022.