Category: Poetry

God’s Grandeur

Sr. Dorcee, belovedLeave a comment

This time of year always brings to mind this poem because, indeed, my part of the world is charged with God’s grandeur.

Nico Angleys

God’s Grandeur

The world is charged with the grandeur of God.

    It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;

    It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil

Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?

Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;

    And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;

    And wears man’s smudge and shares man’s smell: the soil

Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.

And for all this, nature is never spent;

    There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;

And though the last lights off the black West went

    Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs —

Because the Holy Ghost over the bent

    World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

A Year of Jubilee

Sr. Dorcee, belovedLeave a comment

It’s Sunday, and since it is indeed a Year of Jubilee, I thought it would be appropriate to share this poem by Anne Porter. My favorite part is her ending.

A Year of Jubilee

You grew up like a sapling
With fishermen and shepherds
And the God-haunted mountains
Of your small holy country.

You looked the same
As all your people
So for a time
You went unnoticed
You who were later killed
Most cruelly

One Sabbath morning
You stood up in the temple
Young village rabbi
From the provinces

And you unrolled the scroll
And read aloud form it
The Word welled up to us
Out of Isaiah’s book
As fresh as the clear streams
That well up in the mountains

“The Spirit of the Lord
Has come upon me
He has anointed me
To bring glad tidings
To the poor
To heal the brokenhearted
To give the blind their sight
To free the captives
Release the prisoners and proclaim
A year of jubilee.”

We recognized the voice
This was the Promised One
This was the Shepherd
Our hearts were burning

We listened when you told us
About our heavenly Father
Who wishes us
To cherish one another
To be forgiving, generous
As he is himself

And festive, carefree
As the meadow-flowers
Lights as the swallows

He wishes us 
To be like children

You also told us
Our Father
Blesses us most of all
When we are poor

As even when our bodies
Have grown old
And our heads are filled with confusion

He will not love us 
Any the less for that.

004-jesus-nazareth

A Song for Caitlin

Sr. Dorcee, belovedLeave a comment

Sharing this lovely poem by J.B. Toner. May you be blessed.

Song for Caitlin

God’s earth is full of beauty, that I know;
   It scintillates and dances in my eyes,
   Her laughter rolls and rings and multiplies
And makes the turning vistas chime and glow–
But little peace it grants me, even so:
   I cannot cling to bright salvation’s prize;
   The Heaven-light that lights my way soon dies,
For want of faith (perhaps) through which to flow.
And yet my world holds hope and purity,
   Our Lady’s Son redeemed the depths of Hell–
And traces of her grace I still can see,
   Like sun-sparked droplets from a silver well:
This medal round my neck which is, to me,
Three strands of hair from my Galadriel.

Break the box and shed the nard!

Sr. Dorcee, beloved2 Comments

A blessed Easter to all of you, my friends. May you be prodigal in your rejoicing over these next 50 days!

Easter

Break the box and shed the nard;
Stop not now to count the cost;
Hither bring pearl, opal, sard;
Reck not what the poor have lost;
Upon Christ throw all away:
Know ye, this is Easter Day.

Build His church and deck His shrine,
Empty though it be on earth;
Ye have kept your choicest wine—
Let it flow for heavenly mirth;
Pluck the harp and breathe the horn:
Know ye not ’tis Easter morn?

Gather gladness from the skies;
Take a lesson from the ground;
Flowers do ope their heavenward eyes
And a Spring-time joy have found;
Earth throws Winter’s robes away,
Decks herself for Easter Day.

Beauty now for ashes wear,
Perfumes for the garb of woe,
Chaplets for dishevelled hair,
Dances for sad footsteps slow;
Open wide your hearts that they
Let in joy this Easter Day.

Seek God’s house in happy throng;
Crowded let His table be;
Mingle praises, prayer, and song,
Singing to the Trinity.
Henceforth let your souls alway
Make each morn an Easter Day.
 
Gerard Manley Hopkins

The yearning such a fragrance brings

Sr. Dorcee, belovedLeave a comment

This passage has always held great significance for me, especially because of Christ’s invitation to me to live a consecrated life for him. But we, each in his or her own way, are invited by him to pour out what is most precious to us upon his feet, to enter into that intimacy with him, and this week is a most important time for us to do just that.

The Anointing at Bethany

Come close with Mary, Martha ,  Lazarus
So close the candles stir with their soft breath
And kindle heart and soul to flame within us
Lit by these mysteries of life and death.
For beauty now begins the final movement
In quietness and  intimate encounter
The alabaster jar of precious ointment
Is broken open for the world’s true lover,

The whole room richly fills to feast the senses
With all the  yearning such a fragrance brings,
The heart is mourning but the spirit dances,
Here at the very centre of all things,
Here at the meeting place of love and loss
We all foresee, and see beyond the cross.

Malcolm Guite

Royalty

Sr. Dorcee, belovedLeave a comment

A blessed Palm Sunday and Holy Week.  One of my favorite poems by Luci Shaw. 

Royalty

He was a plain man
and learned no latin.

Having left all gold behind
he dealt out peace
to all us wild ones
and the weather.

He ate fish, bread,
country wine and God’s will.

Dust sandaled his feet.

He wore purple only once
and that was an irony.

~Luci Shaw

Beloved is where we begin

Sr. Dorcee, belovedLeave a comment

This has to be one of my most favorite poems of Jan Richardson’s. We are always, always beloved to God.

Beloved Is Where We Begin

If you would enter
into the wilderness,
do not begin
without a blessing.

Do not leave
without hearing
who you are:
Beloved,
named by the One
who has traveled this path
before you.

Do not go
without letting it echo
in your ears,
and if you find
it is hard
to let it into your heart,
do not despair.
That is what
this journey is for.

I cannot promise
this blessing will free you
from danger,
from fear,
from hunger
or thirst,
from the scorching
of sun
or the fall
of the night.

But I can tell you
that on this path
there will be help.

I can tell you
that on this way
there will be rest.

I can tell you
that you will know
the strange graces
that come to our aid
only on a road
such as this,
that fly to meet us
bearing comfort
and strength,
that come alongside us
for no other cause
than to lean themselves
toward our ear
and with their
curious insistence
whisper our name:

Beloved.
Beloved.
Beloved.

—Jan Richardson
from Circle of Grace

It’s Lent, but I feel incapable of praying

Sr. Dorcee, beloved1 Comment

In her usual beautiful prose, Sarah Clarkson writes about her struggle, her incapacity to pray.

THE NIGHT BURNS BRIGHT and dark in my memory, a contrast of moods and scenes like a Caravaggio painting. The cathedral; bright, honeyed stone and gold instruments glinting on the altar. The kindness of my friend and his saving of an excellent seat for me as I skidded in, breathless, the sweet furor of bedtime rituals with my four children still an echo in my brain, a slight wildness in my eye. And the music, a many-layered brightness of harmony and word, hued like a crimson sunset to my synesthetic mind as a small choir sang a selection of ancient Orthodox chants and prayers.

I let myself breathe deeply as the music surged forward, let my eyes rove the warm, dappled space of the medieval church that summer night. But the longer I looked, the more darkness I saw. The shadows like dirty flocks of ravens in the high corners, the vivid stained glass windows I loved so well in the daytime obscured by night, the pain at the back of so many prayers I heard chanted, pleas for God to put an end to despair and death. And the darkness of my own weary heart when the concert had ended and I sat outdoors at a nearby pub and confessed to my long-time mentor and friend, a priest, that I found myself almost unable to pray.

You can read the rest here.