THANKSGIVING SONNETS

I

To Thanksgiving

This holiday is often overlooked

One feels, because it doesn’t generate

The flow of cash, the airlines overbooked,

Hysteria at fear of being late.

A humble, homey, family-style affair,

No supernatural glamour European

Kicks Concupiscence awake to dare

Sobriety to drink and make a scene.

Giving thanks for what one has is not 

In fashion in this Age of Gimmemore.

Virtue, quaintly comical, has got

Inhibited. It fears to be a bore.

Nothing satisfies, however wild, like

Giving thanks for home in manner childlike.

FT ~ The Sandpiper, Autumn, 1994

II

I have no words of praise and thanks today
That would suffice to even make a start,
But only empty hands, a quiet heart,
A joyful debt that I cannot repay.
The dry and empty cup can truly say
The measure of its need; now not in part
But wholly filled with light and love, what art
Of song or verse can praise enough, this day?
O Morning Star! If any word is true,
It points to you, the end of all desire,
And draws its truth from you, the hidden place
That all will find who seek. This gift from you
I’ll praise with words you give: through dark and fire
I’ll sing and pray with coinherent grace.

~ Holly Ordway

III

Thanksgiving starts with thanks for mere survival,
Just to have made it through another year
With everyone still breathing. But we share
So much beyond the outer roads we travel;
Our interweavings on a deeper level,
The modes of life that souls alone can share,
The unguessed blessings of our being here,
The warp and weft that no one can unravel.

So I give thanks for our deep coinherence
Inwoven in the web of Gods own grace,
Pulling us through the grave and gate of death.
I thank him for the truth behind appearance,
I thank him for his light in every face,
I thank him for you all, with every breath

~ Malcolm Quite

IV

On Thanksgiving

Of all events parading through the year

Not one can to this humble feast compare.

To feel or offer thanks today is rare ––

However well our lives remain in gear.

As ease became the norm, we soon forgot 

None of Plymouth’s Pilgrims felt regret. 

Knowing death and cruel privation’s threat

Spoiled not their faith, or made them curse their lot.

Given much yet now we seem to crave

Immeasurable bounty we don’t need ––

Voluptuous excess revealing Greed ––

Indifference to the noble, fine and brave.

No pilgrim, pioneer or great tycoon

Grew up as a self-indulgent goon.

~ FreeThinke - 11/24/11

V

The turkey’s found its silence. So have we

The youngsters and the elders of this hall

Who welcome back both staid and prodigal

With equal eyes. Each knows his own degree

Of happiness on any other day

But this when neural tides must flood or fall

To reach the level common to us all

And flagrant colors fade to neutral gray

The room’s a simple basin of the sea

We yearly swim. Here lies the quiet bay

Where no one claims the single right of way,

Where each is bound to set the other free.

The beaches of this cordial shore forestall

The breakers dimly heard beyond our wall.

~ Lewis Putnam Turco (2010)

VI

On Giving Thanks

Once upon a time, we knew that life

Never guarantees us anything,

Given that, why not just plunge a knife

Into your heart? No form of nannying

Vitiates vicissitude, and yet

Imagination hopes to set aside

Natural Law which says w’re all in debt.

God, the Source of Life, can just provide

The chance to be whatever we can be.

Happiness is found along the way ––

Achieving what we can with Charity.

No panacea can this truth gainsay.

Kings and Vassals –– equal in God’s sight ––

Should each give thanks as they fight the good fight. 

FT ~ The Sandpiper ~ Autumn, 1996