Examen

I received word last week that my poem “Examen” will appear in the Spring issue of Time of Singing, A Journal of Christian Poetry. I can’t decide if my ditty is simply a morose self-portrait of a grumpy old man readying to meet his maker – or a surprisingly hopeful entreaty for one more, perhaps final, love. 

One thing is sure. My poem was written by a guy who has too much time on his hands, pondering the ravages of age that are manifesting themselves before his eyes. 

The Daily Examen is a core practice of the Jesuit religious order. It calls for prayerful reflection on the events of the day in order to detect God’s presence and discern his direction. It’s a technique formulated by St. Ignatius Loyola the founder of the Jesuits, in the sixteenth century.

Here's the poem. It's not the Examen Ignatius had in mind, I know.

Examen 

I watch my body deteriorate daily, 

my personal slack tide far behind, 

that static moment when the body

ebbs and yields to inevitable decline. 

My face is yeasty as risen dough, and 

flesh slides down to turn my smile to frown. 

Knees that jammed my Trek up mountains are 

worn and weary. Equilibrium goes rogue, and 

I clutch handrails both up and down. 

Eyesight disappoints, memory humiliates me 

at every turn. And my feet. My feet. Spawn 

of an alien strain whose mildewed digits 

disgust even veteran mycologists.

A fleshy, fragile creature now, I’m wary of 

falling, that unwelcome herald of death spiral.

Where’s the wind that powered me 

when I gobbled up 26.2 miles and 

left the pack to chase behind? Where’s 

the muscled mass of me that moistened 

the fair sex by mere presence? Turned to sponge.

Only my soul remains fixed and fresh. And I’m 

awake to it. Awake, also, to the expectation of 

seeing you soon face to face. Which calms the 

night and floods my day with light.

I’m at that awful stage of life when family members and friends are shuffling off one by one into eternity. Like lightning bugs on a June evening, their radiance seems to last just a fleeting moment, then they recede into the dark. 

Before the advent of helicopter parenting, we kids were allowed to play outside until it was too dark to see a thrown Spaldeen. We were creative, and made up all sorts of ad hoc games and activities. At least in New Jersey that’s what we did.

When the lightning bugs appeared, we’d catch them in our hands and – using needle and thread supplied by our unknowing mothers – we’d try to string the tortured little wretches into glowing necklaces. We wanted to keep them gleaming forever like living, luminous pearls. 

It never worked.

(Image from original oil painting by James Coates.)