PROPER BURIAL

She was out picking berries –
her leather satchel had
the hardened remains.
The anthropologists figured
it was a land slide and she
was buried down deep
under dirt and rock
what figures like 1400 years ago -
way up there
in the cold north country.
What did her family go through
when she didn’t return – when
she totally disappeared?
Now, she can be seen
even if it’s behind glass
in a proper tomb in a museum.
Visitors stand there
for a few moments reading
the laminated words
about her discovery
in a mining excavation.
No tears. No pain. No funeral.
At least now we know what
happened to one of our family
that day a long time ago.
Who else is out there?
Who else is missing?
How long does it take
to discover, to dig up,
to uncover another’s story,
another's disappearance
from our life?

© Andy Costello, Reflections, 2007

OLD PORCH CHAIR

The paint is peeling
off the old porch chair.
I guess choosing to sit
out here all the time
it never gets a chance
to see all those new
long lasting paints
they advertise on T.V.

© Andy Costello, Poems 2007

HANDICAPPED

He was handicapped;
she was half a person;
all they knew how to do
was complain. Let us pray....

© Andy Costello, Reflections, 2007

SEASONS

Autumn leaves,
some tan, some brown,
some rather unnoticed,
huddled and cornered
trying to keep warm
outside the red brick school,
parents and grandparents,
looking at their watches,
waiting for the afternoon
school bell to sound and
send out to them
hundreds of kids,
running out into the cold,
kids unaware of age and autumn,
kids in their long spring,
kids, a long time till
they are like their parents
and grandparents, autumn leaves,
some tan, some brown,
some rather unnoticed,
after a long hot summer of life,
now huddled and cornered,
trying to keep warm
outside red brick schools.

© Andy Costello, Reflections, 2007

JOB 38 – 39:

A LESSER TRANSLATION

Who teaches the solitary bird
how to fly across an early morning sky?

Who erases the footprints
off the sandy beach during the night?

Who decides on red
for some following mornings?

Who paints the sky,

when it's New Mexico blue?

Who designed babies hands, a woman’s
bend and a 90 year old grandfather’s smile?

Who? Oh You, it’s You.
You again and again. Thank You.

© Andy Costello Reflections, 2007

LOST UMBRELLA

Outside, up above,
it was a rainy day.
Inside, down below,
it was dry.
Here I am
on my way
in a subway.
Someone left an umbrella.
It was left on a seat.
3 or 4 people with umbrellas saw it.
A Chinese lady watching my eyes,
said to me, “Take it.”
I didn’t.
I didn’t need one.
I said, “You take it.”
With a smile

she pointed to the one she had.
It was an old umbrella –
a bit beaten up.
Then I realized
she was free.
The train came to a stop.
The door opened.
A man sitting there with 2 umbrellas
stood up and grabbed this 1 umbrella.
We all watched him

as he left our train.

We all wondered,

"What does one do

with 3 umbrellas

in the rain?"

The Chinese lady smiled

all the way to the next stop.

© Andy Costello, Poems 2007

JOHN 21

God appeared to me
first in black velvet,
then in green moss,
God walking around
the ground outside my house,
leaving soft silent impressions,
footprints, footsteps,
indentations in my life,
then God got louder,
coming through my walls,
morning music from a backyard bird,
an ambulance screaming, howling,
waking me up in the middle of the night,
then JESUS, THE MORNING LIGHT,
dawned on me – coming through
my eastern window
inviting me to stop fishing,
to drop everything,
to come ashore and eat with him,
and I woke up and said,
“It is the Lord.”
And after the feast
he said, “Feed the others.”

© Andy Costello

Reflections, 2007