April of another

This Summer is my last,
Unless I at last see
Something beckoning me further
Through weeping willow trees.

I cannot stay much longer,
For Someone beckons within,
To write, to inscribe my own heart
Before my soul wears thin.

Alas, my dear, I've wandered
Far and sought to be
True to my heart and questions
And now I shall be free.

And now I shall be free
Until my Lord he calls,
To bring me some place elsewhere
Where once again I'm small.

Smaller than where I started
A trifle wiser too.
I pray, my dear, to our God
That I be called to you.

Flesh and Spirit

I did not write this, but it is far too beautiful not to share. It is an excerpt from a sonnet by the 20th century Welsh poet, D. Gwenallt Jones:

God has not forbidden us to love the world
And to love man and all his works,
To love it with all the naked senses together
Every shape and colour, every voice and every sound.
There is a shudder in our blood when we see
The traces of his craftsman's hands upon the world.

Letters to our Mother

Oratory yard bells ring on a slow Saturday morn,
Beckon and bring to prayer the fragiley faithful.
Hortatory words tell the meaning of our who:
Something about mercy, hope, and sacrifice?
I sit here, silent, in a simple seat shouting,
"O rose of such virtue, where are you?
And how did you?" 
For much do I struggle to take up my cross, 
In fear that I might carry
Not the one I can, a burden that is not mine.

I think on what has brought me here,
On what has left me in this place,
On what has sustained me thus,
And of what most keeps my heart in His.
And I think that... perhaps... it is not this,
That maybe I have been spoken to 
In a quite different way
Than I have demanded as of late.

Be it that this pervasive sense of longing,
Which has spoken hence to boyhood
Is not what I need lay down and is even
The very thing constantly called forth
From the depths of my whatness,
Then I will yield you the benefit of doubt,
To see where this winding, cross-strewn road,
Which I have narrowed far more than even your Christ's,
May lead me in so meek an hour.
Ecce filius tuus, ecce mater tua.

Qui decessit

Over the crest of our hill you come, running,
The long-grained grass flowing
In the blowing of a Northerly wind,
And in your Sunday sundress, beaming, 
Your smile brighter than the yellowest of blossom,
The dandelions and sun flower, which reach 
Not toward our dear world's star,
But to you, my little one, as you skip and dance
Through the Elysian fields of God's good countryside.

You pause and stop, the breeze toppling your hair
Over your face and back again,
To reveal the comforting gaze of a child's faith.
My sweetness, look about, 
Cast your gaze on all-greening meadows,
On the butterfly dancing on the cusps
Of late August's warming breath,
And on the mellowing trees 
That do prepare to soon change suit;
To you belongs this great kingdom.

Must I let you go, must I bring you to Him?
And your tiny voice singing resounds
A chorus of hymns far fairer and simply simpler
Than the reaches of the heavenly heralds,
Who announce the coming of a Father 
Greater than I could ever be, despite all your protests.
"But Papa," you exclaim with a look 
That flattens even the tallest of mountains 
And seems to say, "You silly old man." 

O my darling, my daughter, 
You indeed have called my bluff, 
For I am nothing else than as charged,
I am condemned to your loving looks
And laughter; do your worst.
And although age often yields wisdom,
I am but a fool of your coming Autumn,
And I am a fool for you.

I am so open to you this morning

I am so open to you this morning,

As raindrops patter and timidly tap on my window pane,

Asking gently to come in and lie or maybe just stare,

So you, my lovely one, knock at my gates,

Requesting an audience much lower, much sadder

Than that of great popes.

And I cry, I cry: for fear? for loss?

For the All-Knowing Unknowns?

I know not why,

Only that I am so open to you this morning.

Please--when you enter--be gentle, my love,

For my my heart is worn

Not on my sleeve, but... out.

It is tired and yearns for nothing more

Than but to be with you, even for the briefest of moments.

Yet it is so frightened of what you might say,

Or perhaps I am, and what am I other than a heart

With a few bones, some flesh, and firing synapses?

Good Lord, why am I at such fear in the face of

That Which I claim, above all else being,

To seek, to cherish and behold... to love?

Answer me! Answer me, O you wretch,

For I cannot much bear this for much longer.

And yet still here do I remain,

Waiting in the calm silence of a great doctor

And low voices

Rumbling through the walls in preparation.

I am so open to you this morning.

I am so open.

Here

You take me by the hand 
To walk in your gentle garden,
Beckoning me come further
To settle and perhaps sit
Down,
By the chrysanthemums and cucumbers,
Nestled in the corner of your blossoming Spring--
A curious coupling it would seem.

"Come near, my dear one, and rest by my home.
I shall be here your Host.
Learn from me, as you kneel enshrined,
In the hope that I here do reside.

Yet know this, paled traveler, 
Dearest of my heart, 
That I remain here,
That here might become your heart.
Do you think that the God of all that is
Could be so easily caged, 
Held, as it were, in so shallow a shrine?

Though here you must--
As Mother, generations before--
First find me and abide.
Learn to rest, to quiet, to care,
Neither when nor where you will go,
Neither how nor why you will find,
But only that you are, that I am,
That we.
And then you may withdraw."

Laying to Rest a Giant

A week ago we danced into great halls and sanctuaries,
The two-step casket waltz and tears pounding the floor,
And we, we struck our breasts and cried out.
Ushers swayed side to side as they held their post,
And the choir wept, for bitter was the joy of Father gone home.
They'll need more than a few mops to dry this river,
Streams of hope, temporarily damned to the loss:
The sheep have not a shepherd.

And there you lay in your glory, the chantry you built
From ruins, what with your will and prayers.
What could so sustain you, my tired friend?
What ever could bring you such vision and promise?
You have transformed ashes, shards of glass into a palace of hope,
And we cannot forgive you, for you have wronged us not.
We merely tremble at your newfound distance.

Get up! Get up, you wretched actor!
Why do you feign this mortal sleep?
But there you lay, motionless, emotionless,
Yellowed by Hades, a slight smile placed on your face.
And off you are ferried by careful Charon 
Disguised in suits and kente cloth, singing Soon and very soon,
My friend, shall we see you again.