Dancing in the streets

Saturday, July 18, 2020             (today’s lectionary)

Dancing in the streets

For me, yesterday began at 5:30 in the morning and ended around 11 pm. And I didn’t take a nap, and I didn’t eat very much, and … I will be sleeping late today. Lounging deep in my felt freedom to do exactly what I want, all day.

I love the morning hours, though, every one of them. And I resent

Those who plan iniquity and work out evil on their couches

Which in the morning light they accomplish.

In the early ‘70s I lived with my friend Sam in a fourth floor walkup at Hudson and 10^th Streets in Greenwich Village. It really was almost as cool as it sounds like it should be, living there in the center of the center of the world.

We had planned out a couple of films we would make, but then Sam’s equipment was stolen. We’d made movies at Valpo, Sam transferred to the New School in New York to study filmmaking, later he became a professional grip, but now his cameras and tripods and filters all were stolen, and our hearts were broken.

Instead I found a night job typesetting for the NYU and Fordham University student dailies. Myron from Wisconsin did the layout, and I typed the copy. The writers didn’t mind my occasional editing, and there was plenty of time for Myron and I to create pieces for the Liberation News Service (LNS), just down the street. I wrote a poem about chess and life, and Myron pasted it up in a single line around a red and black cardboard chessboard we created to represent the earth.

Often we didn’t finish our work till dawn or even later. We were confident that when all the pedestrian minds of Manhattan went to sleep, our brilliant brains had all the more room to shine. The Manhattan night, bright with neon, lit up with our ideas and imagination and joy.

So I think God is definitely on the right track when he reserves the morning for goodness, when He removes obstacles to grace.

I am planning an evil from which you shall not withdraw your necks

You shall no longer walk with head held high.

And only one song will there be for you to sing:

“Our ruin is complete.”

I remember hurrying to the start of triple features that began at 7 am. Once Myron and I took in the Radio City Rockettes’ first kick-leg shimmy show at 9 a.m., between one movie and the next. Our sleep, at least, was being ruined.

I wish I may, I wish I might, but I did not visit the cathedrals of Manhattan. Nor did I find a way to slip in some volunteer time with the Catholic Worker House, or any other House. My faith was slipping. When I closed my eyes, I listened to the music of Bob Dylan and Joan Baez and Laura Nyro and Donovan. “After Midnight.” “Morning Has Broken.”

I did not think deeply about or pray very much at all … to God.

There is no God, sums up his thoughts.

No, that wasn’t it. I loved the seeking as much then as I do now, but we all were caught in a maze of questions – talking to Sam, to the girl I met on the third floor, to Myron and the kids from NYU and Fordham. I wish I’d taken some Sunday mornings and sought out Sabbath. I wish I’d made it my business to be a servant, rather than always looking out for myself.

You do see. You behold misery and sorrow

And take them in your hands.

God waited for me to depend on him. When I felt lonely and aimless, which was often in spite of Sam’s hospitality,

O Lord, of the fatherless you are the helper.

 You were there for me then, just as you are there for me now.

But you depend on us too

You entrust to us the message of reconciliation.

When Jesus walks the streets of New York or Champaign-Urbana, and I don’t notice, that would be no surprise because Jesus rarely makes a scene. He was gentle then and he’s gentle now; Jesus has been gentle with me for all my life.

He will not contend or cry out,

No one will hear his voice in the streets.

A bruised reed he does not break

A smoldering wick he will not quench

But the path Jesus takes on our nighttime city streets is neither aimless or lonely.

He will bring justice into victory

And at dawn, at noon, after midnight …

It’s in his name we hope.

            (Micah 2, Psalm 10, 2 Cor 5, Matthew 12)

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