Chuck deVarennes

Judas



Judas didn't do it for the money.
Their power stripped his soul of all its worth,
and spit those silver pieces in his eye.
Terror broke his fragile spirit, and they
knew no earthly force would resist that truth.

Jesus knew.  Before the bread was broken
or his stark prophetic words were spoken.
Judas fled to his own doom, the embrace,
the silver insult and his ruined place
in history.  Three times the fisherman

betrayed his Lord when he gave in to fear.
We forget that the same earthly power
forced his trembling denial, but despair
didn't dig Peter a suicide's grave
like poor Judas, whom Jesus did not save.

Lord Jesus Never Drove A Cadillac



Lord Jesus never drove a cadillac.
Nor begged the cash to build a golden tower.
We pray to you God, give us our faith back.

Hell raising preachers thunder that they lack
Worldly wealth to increase heaven's power.
Lord Jesus never drove a cadillac.

The Lamb of God did not use prayer to crack
A cruel whip to make us kneel and cower.
We pray to you God, give us our faith back

From ministers whose purpose is to pack
Collection plates each Sunday worship hour.
Lord Jesus never drove a cadillac.

Denunciations dim our souls to black
Remnants of spirits rendered hard and sour.
We pray to you God, give us our faith back.

Save us from evangelical attack!
Free our battered souls to rise and flower.
Lord Jesus never drove a cadillac.
We pray to you God, give us our faith back.

Unbroken Lines
(our children)



Fifty things to do. Always.
Each task replaced by another
like the jets follow each other,
popping out of the cloudless
sky in rhythmic unbroken lines.

Lists revolve, steady motion,
orb revolves calm and powerful.

They take our gifts without our chains.
We wore down, and they fly!
O how they soar!
Feather souls ever close,

not the dark descent
the cruel mystery we lept
cliffs to smash through.

They're barely kissed by gravity.
We gave them this lightness
so they will leave us behind,

and we are tragically
joyous in that wake.

We bore ahead thickly muscled
knotted in delusive layers.
Bloody bruised

we take our brief balms:

watching evolution
through our purple days.

Stand Up



Stand Up!  They roared when he sang it.
Stand Up!   Mortal, we're reminded
by bruised legs which won't  heal
across the year's swift run.
Stand Up!   A notion out of fashion.
Cool faced cynics pose for their mirrors in the bleeding
light of their illusions.  Stand Up!
Ignore slight tightness in your chest, left thumb
numb at the keyboard and a hundred regrets long and short.
No more enemies no rivals no more pleasing just to please.
No more ego wasted nights.
No more nukes no more puffs of smoke no more
mushrooms no more manufactured dreams!
Stand Up!  O Stand and break into awake!
Stand up and let loose the uncool blood cry that casts
your wrappings  to the ground.  Stand Up!
Build new daydreams on the old wreckage.
Mortal rhythms pound your ears with the surf
sound of slower blood slowing your daydreamed glory.
Stand Up!  Don't weep for your heroes
out of style in old newsreels.  Don't weep at your own
lost youth.  Hang onto nothing!  Stand Up!
Don't store up for thieves the treasures
fear never let you share.  O Stand Up!
Stand Stand Stand.  Let your aging blood run
your rhythm through the land and find your brave
heart before you slip beneath the sand.
They'll forget you when the grief grows old.
Don't store up for thieves or the probate judge.
You must spend all to leave any legacy
so stand stand stand.
Stand Up and Fight!
Fight right into new heartbreak
and don't  hide in your historic pain.  Stand Up!
O god just stand up, let your humor take
the reins and turn the unicorn's starry head.
Stand Stand Stand!  Give up all pretense.
Ride blood beaten rhythms across the desert.
Let your live blood build the soil, feed the roots
and  grow your wild traces.  Stand Up!
Don't succumb to those hints that you could
drop in an instant.  O Stand  O Stand!
Stand beside the balding old men,
their ageless voices still sing.
They are ravaged in weakness.  Yet they stand!
Un-identical twins the father to the artist
to the audience to the hero worshiping heroes!
Stand! Stand! Stand!
Find the view before your eyes and dream that!
O Stand and laugh when men add you up.
Stand! Lift your seed spreading
voice to the unembarrassed skies!  Stand Stand
Stand!  Let history have her say.   Does any sane
mind play to mortal crowds?  Who would feel the first
hints of gone and still be afraid to Stand Up and Fight?
Stand Up!  The star spilled senses.  Stand Up!  The lost lines that flew
through your skipping mind!  Stand Up!  The black night's comfort,
the pine smells and compelled obligations!
Stirring words fall and rise.  Stand Up!
The cries, the sharp ecstatic pain you embraced and fled.
O words!  Spilled like careless coins
across a million notebooks buried in your boxes.
O dreams kept under Lock and Key!
Stored up for thieves.  Stand Stand Stand!
Roars and raptures freed and captured
rip across for one sharp moment!
Wrapped arm warmed round phantom pleasures.
We lost our comfort counting measures. Stand Now!
Stand Up and Fight!  No fuel for thieving fires.
No more sad sighs.  Stand Up! Stand Up!
Defy your father time, false father of the mind
who clings to logic like a crawling babe.
Stand Up!  Bawl at mirrors behind someone else's eyes.
Crack that glass and kick your ass out of your prison.
Stand Stand Stand Up!  Let your warm blood battle the slow
souring stupor.  Stand until you fall.  And then Stand Up!
Listen to falling pain's rhythm.
Blood washed griefs  flow away.
You stand still and hear above all
the street noise and pain cries and all you despise.
You'll die.  That's freedom.
Free to Stand Up and Fight!
Believe your daydreamed visions.  Your dogdayed misery
is your choice, but you can Stand Up!
Young round faces suffer and stare their love lust dreams,
but triumph in the losing chase.
Sweet whispers gilded in the dark
won't hide your spark.  Stand Up!
Stand Up and Fight!

Uncle Remus On The '94 Elections
(a villanelle in slave dialect)



Grand ole party don' med it big dis time.
Sho nuff now dem folks gwine ter get der way.
Bet dey meks bein' po a seerus crime.

I ain't no good at mekin' fancy rhyme.
But black folks better watch out when I say,
Grand ole party don' med it big dis time.

Don't  be der on de street wit out no dime.
Dey wants to know dat yo got cash ter pay.
Bet dey meks bein' po a seerus crime.

Dey'll clean de streets of all dat smut and grime,
Dey won't 'low nekkid dancin an sech play.
Grand ole party don' med it big dis time.

Yo wimmins gwine ter find new hills ter climb,
Atter dem white mens teks yo rights away.
Bet dey meks bein' po a seerus crime.

In each school house de church bells gwine ter chime.
Now all de lil chilluns gwine have ter pray.
Grand ole party don' med it big dis time.
Bet dey meks bein' po a seerus crime.