Sabbath & Light Show—Two Poems by Chris Slaten

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Chris Slaten teaches high school writing and literature most of the time. He also releases music under the name Son of Laughter. His most recent single “The Great One,” an ode to Caesar Augustus, was made possible by listeners who hosted and attended his house and church shows across the country. He’s currently working on a new full length album. He lives in Chattanooga, TN, with his wife, Lyndsay, and their three delightful children.

Light Show

It would cost my family about $100 
to tour the Enchanted Garden of Lights
but as we passed that billboard at dawn

we were looking the other way 
with all the other sunrise rubberneckers
who would have gladly bought tickets 

for the glowing panorama, the complimentary feast 
of salmon-pink cloud flesh cooking over 
the bare black treeline burning with orange glory.

As children of Adam do
we were scrounging for metaphors
to name all the glittering goodness.

On the cool blue soil of the sky 
some reckless Sower was flinging 
handfuls of wispy electric seeds. 

Some matchless Warrior had raided 
the dragon’s hoard and scattered the gold
to glow all over the cowering village 
and every bit was free, free, free!

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Sabbath

Rest as if finished.
Eat as if plenty.
Pray as if answered.
Rejoice as if grateful.
Praise as if awed. 
Speak as if known.
Breathe as if arrived.
Confess as if forgiven.
Sing together as if one.
Delight as if unburdened. 
Pretend as if children at play
      practicing for a coming day.

Tomorrow we will work as if rested.

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Photo by Brian McMahon` on Unsplash