Mark Goad- Two Poems

Nativity

You must believe in your greatness

even if it is as little as admiring

a golden leaf for its glory.

There was room

in your heart for this at least, a quiet

nativity in you. 

Do you want something greater than

this?  How empty can you

afford to be?

In the inn

there was no room.

Who Will This Temple Cleanse?

If God’s temple, I –

and why should I such grace be given? –

better to get to cleaning house – and soon:

Miserly old wretches, lechers,

grumblers, the impious,  

vicious, vengeful,

calculating,

devils of every kind

have made a home under God’s roof.

Who, Lord, will drive them out?  Who

will overcome what little I have been?  Who

will this temple cleanse? 

Mark Goad is a poet now living in the Boston metro area (USA). Born in Ohio, he has lived and studied in Chicago, Geneva, Switzerland and Boston (with sojourns in Connecticut and rural Nebraska). Undergraduate and graduate studies have been completed in English Lit., German language, theology and philosophy.  His work has been published previously in Assisi, BAPQ, epiphany, bluepepper, Decanto, Big River Review, Extracts, Crannóg, Ayris, The Wayfarer, Contrary, Christian Century, Calvary Cross, Poetry Salzburg Review and other literary journals.