‘Dinner In Spain’ by Elizabeth Akin Stelling
Inspiration
WHAT IS GOOD FOR THE GOOSE
As Taught by Sister Erin
by Tyson West
My children sweet you see ─
All is part of God’s plan
And so is nothing
For without a plan there is no God
Consider geese ─ good Catholics all
Even those way stationing in Protestant or Muslim lands
Not proselytizing our faith but still prepared to die for it
Their patron saint, Martin of Tours, appointed bishop ─ silly goose himself before God’s will,
Feeling unworthy at his pending investiture,
Concealed his white robe in hope among their white feathers that
God’s hand would not wring his neck
But they ratted him out
Righteously so for the greater glory of God.
Heathen monkeys worship their Hanuman and the Jackal and the Ibis headed gods of Egypt boast of their bestial divinity
Making Jesus cry
But except for the general love of St. Francis, most animals get no saint.
Kiddies, Mother Goose must be an abbess
And aren’t geese martyred at the birth of our Savior?
Consider this photo from Spain
A flock of white geese gleans a cornfield
Good maize from the Americas
Leaving not one corn of corn to abide alone
Christ taught the conquistadores of the maize
Through the red men whose souls they sojourned to save
God gaggles all geese to heaven
Still my children
Love orders the world as we know it or not
Yet I will confess to you my children
The cold ocean of feelings that washes over me in the background
Christ I shiver at
Primal horsetails growing chaos in the wild wasteland behind the field
Lingering forage for grazing thunder lizards
Fear of earthquake
Epona riding the night
And the persistence of Poseidon.