Janeal Turnbull Ravndal

Recipient of the first Best of Friends Award for Poetry.

Blazing this fall day
We walk an embarrassment
Of elegant streets.
In this neighborhood
Not even a rosebush looks
To be neglected.

The gravest danger
On our six mile way: one small
Square of wet cement.

At our first check-point:
Rich, chocolate cake is spread
With cream cheese icing.

On the world’s other
Side and near, the poor have no
Cake, no crossing guards.
Do we, prosperous,
Momentarily hunger,
Craving righteousness?

Give us this day our
Daily forgiveness, O Thou
Extravagant Love.

Leaves fall, the color
Of pears, of pomegranates,
Of hot, buttered loaves.

Copyright © by Janeal Turnbull Ravndal.