An Essay a Day

Good morning!

An essay is an attempt, and these little daily essays are attempts to make some kind of statement.  The heart of what we are trying to say often eludes us, but we keep trying (essaying) for success.

A poem a day is also an attempt. By its very nature it can only be a sketch of what we mean to say.  Like a dream, the whole poem in its perfection exists somewhere. We try to capture it before it evaporates entirely.  And I do believe that overworking is as bad as ignoring the whole thing, often. 

Yesterday's book club report was of the poem-a-day variety.  Incomplete, and yet in some measure it taught me  line by line what I was trying to say.  If I stay with it a bit, it will improve. If not, there it is, a sketch, a day's worth of poem hanging in midair unfinished. And yet you'll maybe agree with me that the germ of poetry in it stays with you after you've read it. There's a thought there, however unfulfilled completely.

It is like our lives. Every day we get up, start off with the best of intentions to get it right this time and use our observations and intelligence to make the best life we can.  Sometimes we are taught what the day is about as we go along. Sometimes we miss the point, or we like lambs have such a good time that we forget to pursue it.  Those are good days too! Perhaps the best.

God seems to ask two things of us (according to Jimmy Swaggart, who in spite of messing up a lot of his personal days in my opinion) (and I have no right to an opinion about his days): God asks that we praise his name and that we give thanks. As a matter of fact I saw Jimmy Swaggart say this on television, and he said, "First give thanks for our lives,"and then he went into his little trancelike dance as he said, "And praise and bless his Holy Name."  How simple. I try to remember to do this. Say, God be praised. Thanks be to God for this day. And then we essay to live our lives. I don't do the little dance, but maybe it helps.
YAZZYBEL