Found in the files
...Poem written as an undergraduate and heavily revised about six years later

Nothing Worth Mentioning

November house on the road to nowhere
its rusted sign for vacancy
a Northstar to compassless
young people chasing every nightmare
they never bothered mentioning.
Nine volt voices grow static
in the crackle snip snap darkness
while endlessly rehearsing
the first six verses of nothing
new under the sun.

Old people stare out of sightless
eyes at nothing--
well, nothing worth mentioning
in asphalt forests where everything
falls without sound.
Rocking chairs wear ruts
like the Oregon Trail acorss
front porches, in living rooms
with insomniac zombies
drunk on the late, late, late show.

November house on the road to nowhere
beckons with echoed chantings
and captivates fading consciousness
that comprehends
only a sinuous cycle of
death and life a single cry.
Winnowed minds gone amoebic
flinch dark flinch bright
to the shifting light of a mythic lie
and Carl Jung, a macabre-masked face,
dances around the pyre.

Teen reading
We are planning to run a summer reading contest at our church library for kids and teens. We hope to increase use of the library through this event. To really do that, however, we need to have adequate materials for our young patrons to check out.

With the under 12 set, we have a pretty big collection, including some large series like Trailblazers, Sugar Creek Gang, Mandie, Heroes of the Faith. What concerns me is how little fiction we have for teens.

I don't want to fill the shelves with nothing but Christianized romance novels. I know we can reorganzie materials a little and point teens to some of the general fiction, which includes authors like George MacDonald, Stephen Lawhead, Walter Wangerin, Jan Karon, J.R.R. Tolkein and Charles Williams. Is there any other good fiction that's appropriate for 12-16 year olds that would be good to add to our collection?

I've begun compiling a list of books that kids could get from the public library that are not so explicitly Christian but still good. They include selected works from authors like Katherine Paterson and Madeline L'Engle. Suggestions for this list would also be appreciated.

Kimmel
Our free dress rehearsal concert on Monday, May 17 starts at 7 p.m. Doors open at 6:30 and it's general seating, so arrive early for best seats. The Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts is at the corner of Broad and Spruce streets in Philadelphia; we will be in Verizon Hall.

Choral life
Choir rehearsals have been much more intense lately. We're gearing up for our church's big 175th anniversary concert at the Kimmel Center on May 18.

One of the pieces we're singing was commissioned from Philadelphia composer Kile Smith, who has a pretty extensive repertoire of sacred music under his belt. Using Psalm 46 as the text, the piece has lots of syncopation and modernist harmonics--reminds me somewhat of Arvo Pärt. It splits into as many as 10 parts in places. Tough stuff to learn, but as we hammer out pitches and rhythms, it's really growing on me.

The concert itself is free, though all of the seats "sold out" months ago. Therefore, our director is opening the dress rehearsal to the public. If anyone is in or near the Philly area, you're welcome to come to Verizon Hall at the Kimmel Center to hear us on Monday, May 17. I'll post the time as soon as I find out.