Serenity Prayer from 7/23/24

by Kenneth Godoy

N.A.
Courage spots sun on the pyramid bricks.
The scuffing wheelchair holds
The almost invalid.
Crawling coffee stains
The cryptic tiling floor.
4:44. The smoke breaks
Like a life-long chain.
Oh the groaning patients’ pain
Secured behind the unwashed, silver door.

A.A
Harry draws his problems
With a pencil-pen.
John keeps pacing wondering how
The dead accept amends.
Gary sleeps. The pepper-plastic
Table stands without regret.
(“Regret for what?” it says.)
The yard-wind smells like power-lines and
Three small birds that don’t know
What September is;
That thirty August suns will not
Be over easy yet.

2.A-Unit weighs a random measurement
Of men from one to twenty-five.
The rusting finger clipper sans the file
Clips all the broken bits. Nail this.
Lustless windows open only quarter-way;
Screws halt their scape.
Today, the mentholated tubes force
Burning air beyond their teeth and brain.
The smoke, with silent tongue,
Confesses what the men
Can’t bring themselves to say.

N.A
Serenity defaults—as if it had a choice!
Without a vote or voice
Serenity accepts the things
It cannot understand or name:
At birth we’re old enough for suffering and death.
Day to day, existence calcifies this truth, this pain.
And so the angry man throws bowls
But can’t say why. While
Upstairs Courage cowers
In the bed it should have left and made.
This morning, Wisdom cheeked its med
And split it for a T-shirt and a square.
Wisdom stole a comb for hair
It doesn’t have or claim.
Oh Gentlemen, last call! N.A.! A.A.!

Despite the god and everything,
This world
Will not
Become
unfair.

Just because poetry isn’t directly about Jesus or religion doesn’t make it less meaningful or utilitarian then that neatly bound, predictably themed, yellow plastic shopping bag of a hymn or inspirational sonnet. Open-mindedness, humility and willingness are the only way to read poetry and/or live a generally fruitful, vibrant, experienced life.

Photography by Kenneth Godoy