Of Kindling and Light
Home from work
to a house cold and dark
I create a companion
of left-over embers, paper,
kindling, and cedar logs
My friend breathes
and moves and grows –
a living being of warmth
It fills my home with light
and comfort.
– Karen Molenaar Terrell
Relentless
Irrepressible
Unstoppable
Truth
and
Love
rising
– Karen Molenaar Terrell
Super moon rising over Mount Baker, Bow, Washington, New Year’s Day 2018.
I was in the car with Scott, listening to a radio show – there was some comedy bit about avocados and bananas, and then a story about potato gun wars between the employees of neighboring restaurants. And the guys talking were completely relaxed and enjoying themselves – there was no hint of worry about the state of the world, no mention of Donald Trump. They seemed totally free of doubt or fear. They were joyful without question, or reason. And for just a moment that silly radio show helped me transcend Trump and politics and war and fear and worry. For just a moment I felt an indescribable, effortless, fearless joy. For a moment I caught a glimmer of simple, uncomplicated happiness – a moment of heaven. And that moment gave me hope, my friends. I saw that this kind of joy is possible – and I remembered, vaguely, experiencing it as a child…
A glimmer of joy
pure, fearless, free, soaring high
taste of what can be
– Karen Molenaar Terrell
Dressed up to greet Dad when he gets home from work. (I’m guessing Mom went through a lot of laundry detergent.)
Karen in her twirly dress.
Happiness is spiritual, born of truth and love. It is unselfish; therefore it cannot exist alone, but requires all mankind to share it.
– Mary Baker Eddy, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures
Ode to Boxing Day
It’s a humble holiday, tucked in between
Christmas and New Year’s, but it’s really keen.
Things look a little bedraggled, it’s true
The tree’s a little droopy and no longer new
The movies and music of the Christmas season
Are getting on our nerves now, and we’re seeing no reason
To eat even one more sugary oversweet sweet
It’s time for broccoli and carrots (maybe hold on the beets)
The pressure for perfection comes off on this day,
the toys have been opened, and it’s come time to play.
And if before we were wearing faux holiday cheer
to blend in with the others and not Scroogey appear
It’s time now to be genuine, and honest and real.
The food banks are empty, people still need a warm meal.
The homeless and hungry and jobless and alone
still need love and care, still need a home.
So maybe we can celebrate the day after Christmas
by keeping the spirit of hope alive,
we might make that our business.
– Karen Molenaar Terrell, from A Poem Lives on My Windowsill
Waiting for the Christmas Spirit
The kitsch and spangles
and baubles and bangles,
And department store Santa,
just really can’ta
Seem to bring me
the spirit of Christmas.
And I’ve been waiting to feel it –
the real Christmas spirit
Hoping it’d come by now.
The stockings are stuffed,
the tree is all buffed,
The cookies are baked
and frosted and fluffed
But there’s still something missing –
a feeling, a tingling
that’s supposed to come every Christmas.
Except…
Maybe that Christmas feeling,
that energy and tingling
Is something I can have every day –
It doesn’t depend on spangles,
or jingly-bell jangles
Or jolly men dressed all in red.
It comes in the sharing
of laughter and caring
And the comfort in words with love said:
To all – Peace! Joy! Hope!
Every moment of every day.
– Karen Molenaar Terrell, from The Madcap Christian Scientist’s Christmas Book
“Love, redolent with unselfishness, bathes all in beauty and light.”
– Mary Baker Eddy
The darkest day will be here soon
and then the light will return –
unstoppable, irresistible, irrepressible –
and all that was hidden in the darkness
will be revealed.
Behold the glory of Truth and Love!
– Karen Molenaar Terrell
“Let there be light!”
– Genesis 1
I feel her with me –
whenever I think of her,
she’s here. I feel her
when I’m kind and doing
something nice
for someone else.
I don’t feel her as eyes
watching me. Or as a ghost.
I don’t feel her as a physical
being at all. But I feel
the essence of her.
And I think she’s helping
me understand more
about who we are, really.
Not limited beings trapped
in these bodies, you know?
– Karen Molenaar Terrell
Endings that are new to me
this Christmas.
Beginnings that are new to me, too.
I miss Moz. I grin as I watch Sparky
the new kitty scamper around
the Christmas tree, chasing
his big sister, Clara – experiencing
his first Christmas. I decide
to make cookies, open up my recipe
book, find the recipe for boiled
cookies and see it written in Moz’s
handwriting. I’d forgotten
she’d given me that recipe.
Moz never got to meet Sparky.
He never got to meet Moz.
But they both celebrate Christmas
in this house – one in the past,
one in the present.
– Karen Molenaar Terrell
When I drove home from work yesterday I noticed the flag was flying at half-staff again. I knew then there’d been another shooting. When I got home I learned two students had been shot and killed at a school in New Mexico. The story of the shooting came at the end of the news program. Death by gunfire at a school is now so commonplace it’s not considered top news anymore.
The NRA stinks.
And now a poem –
Half-Staff Flag
The flag is at half-staff again
or still.
I can’t remember the last time
I saw it waving from the top
of the pole.
Days? Weeks? Months? Years?
Someday it will rise again,
someday when we put our fears
to rest, and begin
to trust each other once more,
put down our weapons of words
and steel, and pour healing
love into our nation’s wounds.
– Karen Molenaar Terrell, from The Brush of Angel Wings
T’was two weeks afore Christmas and all through Eff Bee
not a creature was stirring – not a she, he, or me
We were prostrate and spent from the holiday bustle
not a twitch could be seen from the teeniest muscle…
T’was Two Weeks Afore Christmas
T’was two weeks afore Christmas and all through Eff Bee
not a creature was stirring – not a she, he, or me
We were prostrate and spent from the holiday bustle
not a twitch could be seen from the teeniest muscle.
We lay all unblinking in our respective beds
while visions of gift-wrapping swirled through our heads
And clad in our jammies and our way cool madcaps
we had the vague hopeful hope our bodies would take naps.
Holiday jangles and jingles pinged through our brains –
Presley, Crosby, and Mathis taking us down memory lanes –
and would we remember every member to be gifted?
We mentally went through our lists, hoping none were omitted.
There were homes to be decorated and cards to be sent,
parties, caroling, and cookie-making, and we hadn’t made a dent.
But with a collective sigh we remembered there…
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Adventures of the Madcap Christian Scientist 