A. Grayson's Journal

10:32am: NEW BLOGS
My (relatively) new poetry blog:

http://www.agraysonpoems.blogspot.com

My new blog for sermons and poetic reflections on scripture:

http://www.eatthisscroll.blogspot.com

All of my new posts appear at these two sites. Ta ta, dears.

2:33pm: New Posts
New posts at:


www.agraysonpoems.blogspot.com
www.stcharlespoems.blogspot.com

Check 'em out.

11:08pm: Deconstructionist Poetry Liverjournal Program
Does anyone remember this program that was floating around livejournal a while ago, that you could type in your http and it would slice up your text and spit out a deconstructionist poem of your blog? It was silly, and fun, and occasionally would come up with something that (given a LOT of editing) was sort of neat.

Lemme know!

***Check out my new blog at***
http://www.agraysonpoems.blogspot.com

11:02pm: Wedding Comin' up!
It's been some time since my last post.

Well, the wedding fast approaches, which is exciting. Jasmine (Hope's childhood cat--now our cat) is adjusting well to her temporary accomodations in my dorm, but she's so large she doesn't always manage to do her business in the rather small litterbox I got for her. She has some sort of fancy-shmancy electric self-cleaning litterbox which is too large and cumbersome to mess with now, so I'll just have to deal with it.

It's nice to have a cat again. She's very affectionate. She's a tortoiseshell, short-hair, and very fat. She comes and rams me with her nose while I'm trying to sleep. She also meows at me constantly. I mean, Hope told me that she was a vocal cat, but this is absurd.

*****Check out my new blog at*****
www.agraysonpoems.blogspot.com

11:38am: New Blog Site
Hey all. I have a new blog site for poetry only. Come 'n check it out:

www.agraysonpoems.blogspot.com

11:28pm: Pygmalion pauses to admire his bridge
It isn't that I doubt that every block
of marble holds a future sculpture's form,
straining to be shorn of excess rock;
But in each, how many bodies swarm?
It's not the line I write that haunts;
But for each word I use, twelve ghostly words--
each in its way as fitting and as right--
gutter like smoke, unwritten and unheard.
It's not the choice itself that paralyses;
It's the death of all those choices.
I'd love to ask Michelangelo
(that seer of possibility in stone)
if just before the hammer's shattering blow,
he heard the other could-be statues moan?
So with each word, the others fly
like chips of marble, or like bits of bone.
The cheek emerges; other faces flee.
The dust settles. What is done is done.
I take her hand. Why was I so scared?
She's lovelier than I could have dared.

1:41am: Oh, the fun.
Hmm... Can't sleep.

I had, seriously, like the most fun evening ever. It was like, Night of the Living Dead Fun Evening. The Hedges, those last bright beacons of amazing party craziness shining in an otherwise dull and dreary world, invited me to what was to become the Summer Music Improtublastathon, '05. Luke, beer, and good music were enjoyed by all.

Now, I can't sleep, b/c I had the bad idea to exercise while I still had adrenaline pumping through my body. Which went beautifully, only of course I STILL have adrenaline b/c I exercised, and now I can't sleep.

Feh. Good night, amigos. Stay beautiful.

1:45pm: Yay! I love obsessing over artists!
So, I emailed Liz Janes, this awesome singer/songwriter, letting her know how much I liked her cd's I bought, and asking after this obscure EP of hers that I have one song from. Apparently, it's out of print after a print run of only 100 or so. Well, she emailed me back and said she would be willing to burn me a copy and send it to me! Fun!

Oh, check her stuff out, it's amazing:

www.asthmatickitty.com

2:12pm: Hmm... Churchery, anyone?
Based on the lj interests lists of those who share my more unusual interests, the interests suggestion meme thinks I might be interested in
1. orthodoxy score: 14
2. eschatology score: 13
3. christology score: 11
4. soteriology score: 10
5. ecumenism score: 10
6. pneumatology score: 9
7. mass score: 8
8. sacraments score: 8
9. hermeneutics score: 8
10. book of common prayer score: 7
11. eucharist score: 7
12. ontology score: 7
13. evensong score: 6
14. calvinism score: 6
15. episcopal score: 6
16. gregorian chant score: 6
17. immaculate conception score: 6
18. exegesis score: 6
19. seminary score: 6
20. purgatory score: 6

Type your username here to find out what interests it suggests for you.
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1:30pm: My Body Knows It's Not Alone in Bed
Sunday, six AM: the eyelids rolled
like windowblinds against the light that bleeds
in through the windows, eyes drawn back, the blood
burrowing further inward from the cold.
Under the comforter's weight
the body curls into its animal heat,
a sightless puppy nestling toward the heart-
beat of its mother and its littermates.
It only wants what we all want: this warmth
as close as your own marrow.
In my dreams, it isn't yet tomorrow,
the coals are not yet cold piled on sleep's hearth,
I don't have to be anything but my breath.
I'm not yet hooked beneath the gills by time,
dragged up by a line
of scheduled moments ground between my teeth.
For now the blood-warmed flesh, that sweet, dumb creature
briefly liberated from the reign
(others would say tyranny) of the brain
shivers, and moves to reach her.

3:06pm: Half-Handed Cloud
Saw a (free) performance of relatively unknown gem "Half-Handed Cloud," which you can find on Asthmatic-Kitty Records, if you're interested.

10:22pm: pralines - post dedicated to Dave's mom
do y'all say "PRAY - leens" or "PRAH - leens?"

As a good New Orleanian, I not only say it PRAHlines, I consider it an abomination before the LORD your God to say it the other way.

Yeah, Leah's... I went there with my grandfather, who apparently knows the owner, (with one or two degrees of separation). They do indeed have good pralines, and I just brought some Leah's pralines to Heather's house on a game night just a few weeks ago. I think your son might have even had one of them.

8:52pm: Reminder: post-ord celebration thingey
As mentioned a few posts ago:

If anyone would like to celebrate with me after my ordination, I'd love to go have dinner somewhere or get coffee, whatever. Mebbe Ninja or PJ's.

It's also your golden opp to meet/chat-up the lovely and talented Hope Tinsley. Also last chance to see me, b/c we'll both be driving off to Florida (and then, I to Chicago) the next morning.

9:33am: The ordination approacheth!
Well, had a lovely 11pm Christmas Mass at the Cathedral, at which I wore three hats-- intercessor, usher, and oblationer. The Bishop gave a great sermon.

Today, church is at 10 instead of the usual 11. *shrug* no biggee.

It's hard for me to really grasp the fact that my ordination is coming in only 3 days. I'll have a Quiet Day, a sort of miniature retreat, for most of the day before at Advent House, so that should help me and the other ordinands detox from Xmas retail frenzy and prepare ourselves spiritually.

11:05pm: It's snowing!
...In New Orleans!

...On Christmas Day!

...for the first time in FIFTY YEARS.

7:32pm: Calling all Mix-Tapers - Wedding Music Needed
Oh, for all of you public-spirited music lovers out there:

Want to help Hope and Andrew with the music-related end of their wedding plans? Sure you do! As we are planning on putting together a number of cd's for the wedding reception (rather than hire a DJ or band), we find ourselves in need of wedding-appropriate music. If you feel so inclined, throw as many love-songs or whatever on an mp3 cd and we'll use some of it in the wedding.

PS.-- Have you ever been sitting in a wedding reception, enjoying yourself and the music, when suddenly you realize the song is *wildly* inappropriate for a wedding? I think many wedding DJ's (or whoever picks the music) don't really think about the lyrics. Many love songs are actually about infidelity, cheap sex, or one night stands? I'm thinking especially about this one song "Oh, What a Night" that I've heard at I don't KNOW how many receptions. Craziness!

7:25pm: News from New Orleans
Midnight service tonight. Let it not be said that Cathedral parishioners are not hardcore about their churchgoing. As a sort of last-ditch effort to have me serve in as many layperson roles as possible before my ordination, I'll be wearing *three* hats tonight: usher, intercessor, and oblationer.

HEADLINE NEWS: From my meeting with the Bishop: I'll be setting a wedding date with Hope sometime fairly soon! Probably looking at a Saturday in September. Further, I'll not have to spend my first year as a newlywed away from my wife! I was afraid of that. Nope, I'll be up in Chicago another year. What I actually *do* with that year is as of yet undecided; I have a few possibilities to think about, pray about, and investigate.

Looks like it's going to be a rather spare year at the Benko household. In contrast to our usual Christmas blow-outs, it may be as little as 4 people-- myself, the 'rents, and Grandpa-- for Christmas dinner tomorrow. Dean's cousin Mary *might* come with two of her grandchildren, but apparently the kids got sick, and it's probably not a good idea to expose Grandpa to whatever they have. At his age, you don't want to court illness.

5:16pm: Colored lights on living trees
Some of the trees out in the West Garth, including these adorable conical little evergreens, are decked out with these lovely colored Christmas lights. Now, I'm not usually one for Christmas trees, because it makes me sad that we cut down thousands of trees for the baby Jesus every year. I'm not usually one for Christmas trees *also* because sometimes I think all the dangly ornaments are sort of tacky. Also, I usually don't go in for Christmas lights-- but that's 'cuz they're always white, not many lovely colors.

But give me a bunch of living trees, still growing in the ground, bedecked with dazzling little colored lights-- Rah! It's lovely out here. It's the same sort of lovely (to me) as stained glass in a dark chapel during the day, when all the colors are dancing around on the floor. Lah.

Chapel in 10 minutes. Last Community Eucharist of 2004 at Seabury.

10:00pm: Diaconal Ord Countdown
To all of my lovely friends in New Orleans, and you know who you are:

My ordination to the Diaconate will be on December 29, Wednesday, at 6:00 pm. It will be at Christ Church Cathedral, on St. Charles.

I would love to have any of you come to support me and see me through this unique milestone.

Come as you are, but if you feel inclined to dress up, feel free.

We may want to go out afterwards (Ninja?) to celebrate, so if anyone is interested, maybe we could plan on that, too. I need to chat with my folks about what they expect to do aftewards.

Oh, and if you haven't met the lovely-and-loveable Hope yet, this is your chance! She'll be in town for my ordination; we'll be leaving almost immediately thereafter (I have GOE's on the 3rd).

Pax and Tickles,

Andrew

PS. the only reason I am posting at the moment is that I am the worst (or would you say best) procrastinator. I should be working on my paper now... I'm doing a presentation+paper on religious satire for my 'England and the Age of Reform' class-- a fairly interesting topic, really.

6:44pm: T-minus just a few days...
So, the end of the term is this far away...

1) measured in days: 3
2) measured in papers: 1

Soon, I'll be frantically getting Christmas gifts/cards made/bought. Tra la. I can't wait to see my friends and family in New Orleans.

I've got to jump-start my car before I can leave Chicago. I left the lights on after church this Sunday. Bleah.

9:27pm: Audrey meets Andrew
Audrey's coming to town! I'm finally going to meet Hope's sister. I'm looking forward to it.

This week should be relatively relaxed. We have the week off, so I'll just be meeting/hanging-out-with Audrey, having Thanksgiving dinner, and working on papers and such.

In other news: the Diocese of LA Standing Comm finished deliberating: I am now officially to be ordained to the transitional diaconate! It'll be December 29th at six. Hope is going to come to town to be there.

CURRENT PROJECT: I'm working on a project for Anglican Worship, for which I hope to collect and collate various sources which use non-masculine language for God. I'm only looking for sources which are biblical or from early-Christian saints. I'm attempting to make this as unimpeachably "orthodox" as possible, so it has to be from sources like these that even conservatives/traditionalists can't argue with.

7:28pm: Sarah comes to town...
Wow, Sarah's gonna be here in something like 2 days. Or is that one? Anyway, it's gonna be great to see her, and we (Hope/Andrew/Dave/Steph/Sarah) are all going to the Sufjan show together-- where, I learned last night, we might expect to see Neal and Carey as well. Woo-Hoo!

All will be merriment and good times at the Hedges tonight, as we enjoy the champagne so generously provided by Mark. Hope's off shopping for nibbles at World Market to round out the night's provisions. Rah!

At the moment, we're discussing the Clergy/Penitent privilege in Canon Law. This deals with confidentiality in the Rite of Reconciliation of the Penitent (Confession). It's interesting stuff. As some of y'all may know, I just did a group project on Confession in another class earlier this term, so I'm fairly interested.

10:18am: ...a loaf of bread, a stick of butter...
Grocery list:

1) I'm working on my project for Anglican Worship... I'm doing a Celtic-based Eucharistic Rite, along the lines of the BCP "Order for Eucharist." I've got a stack of books that's almost three feet tall on my desk here.

2) I used the project as an excuse to buy "2000 Years of Prayer," this book I've had my eye on for almost six months now. I used this same book when I was putting together prayer forms for Anglican Prayer Beads last year. It has really wonderful prayers from various strands of the Christian tradition, and from the "bigwigs" of the religion-- saints and the like. It's prayerriffic!

3) Sufjan Stevens, amazingly wonderful singer/songwriter, coming to Chicago! He's the most amazing artist ever, with poetic and meaningful lyrics and engaging composition. The Hedges have my eternal gratitide for turning me on to him. Saw him last year with Hope and Dave/Steph, and he was predictably amazing.

4) Not sure if this whole "data-dump" approach to Livejournal is my favorite, but it may be all I have the energy for right now.

5) Hope is amusing herself by looking at wedding-cake-toppers and dresses on the internet. She's already registered for an account on "The Knot" and set a fake, hypothetical date so she can watch the little countdown it keeps. (In actuality, we have not set a date.) Kid in a candy shop, I tells ye.

6) Thanks for all the well-wishing, y'all. :)

12:55pm: **WE INTERRUPT DANGRAY'S 10-MONTH POSTING HIATUS TO ANNOUNCE**
I'm engaged!

7:35pm: Hum.
...Feeling mysteriously bummed. Dunno quite why. Ach.

...Prolly gonna go study Greek w/ Jane later. Ought to print up some articles for my Ethics paper before that. Might just end up watching Thursday night tv in Junkin with a glass of chartreus in my hand.