Two poems this Sunday by two different poets who were both inspired by pondering God’s garments. And both stemming from a felt need to frantically reach out to grab them. We can all feel that way at times, especially during Lent. I’ll just leave them here with the encouragement to try to place yourselves in each poem.
Suspended
I had grasped God’s garments in the void
but my hand slipped on the rich silk of it.
The ‘everlasting arms’ my sister loved to remember
must have upheld my leaden weight from falling, even so,
for though I claw at empty air and feel nothing, no embrace,
I have not plummeted.
Denise Levertov
The Garments of God
God sits on a chair of darkness in my soul.
He is God alone, supreme in His majesty.
I sit at His feet, a child in the dark beside Him;
my joy is aware of His glance and my sorrow is tempted
to nest on the thought that His face is turned from me.
He is clothed in the robes of His mercy, voluminous garments–
not velvet or silk and affable to the touch,
but fabric strong for a frantic hand to clutch,
and I hold to it fast with the fingers of my will.
Here is my cry of faith, my deep avowal
to the Divinity that I am but dust.
Here is the loud profession of my trust.
I need not go abroad
to the hills of speech or the hinterlands of music
for a crier to walk in my soul where all is still.
I have this potent prayer through good or ill:
here in the dark I clutch the garments of God.
Jessica Powers
Witnesses to Hope 