Welcome to the Abbey’s Poetry Party #57!
I select an image and suggest a theme/title and invite you to respond with your own poem. Scroll down and add it in the comments section below. Feel free to take your poem in any direction and then post the image and invitation on your blog (if you have one), Facebook, or Twitter, and encourage others to come join the party! (permission is granted to reprint the image if a link is provided back to this post)
I have recently discovered a stash of copies of my first book on lectio divina (published by Paulist Press, written with Sister Lucy) and so I will be sending out free signed copies to the first 25 people to share their poems (will be mailed out the week of May 7th). When you submit your poem, please also email me directly with your mailing address (I’ll send confirmation I received it, but I won’t be chasing down folks for their addesses). This is my way of saying thank you for participating in the Abbey community.
This photo is of one of the doors to Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. I love this found mandala, because for me, I could see the clear boundary of the center where the knocker for the door was and where you request entry to the inner sanctum, and then the extension outward from there of the design which had a reaching quality to me and sense of how our service to others extends out into the world. We are called to dance on life’s edges, stretching the boundaries and horizon. I felt the beautiful tension between the center and the edges and how we are called to both – each one nourishes the other.
I invite you to ponder this image and see what it evokes in your heart. Let that be a starting point for your poem writing. Then scroll down to the comments section and share it here with our Abbey community.
54 Responses
Rings extend
concentric,
from the soul
of the oak outward
to the bark,
more rings and more
stretching the tree
toward sun and air,
toward the rain.
Rays extend
from the pupil,
constricting
or relaxing, reaching
for the light,
stretching through the iris
to the border,
like the ditches,
containing
back country roads,
way into the soul.
Longings extend
from the seat,
the heart,
through the juices
and the soul
to the boundaries
to my skin
where I am met
in his eyes,
in the oak rings,
in myself,
edges and middles,
boundaries and boundless.
My soul will
shuffle her feet
on the edges of his iris,
lost in the rhythm
and the sacred
of friendship,
union-love,
waiting for the yes
to carry me down his roads.
My skin will
shuffle these fingertips
from bark to the center,
dancing the
labyrinth of the oak,
tracing its history,
into its mystery,
its life-flow.
My eyes will
shuffle their sight
from my skin through the layers
to my essence
where divine dwells,
where I am lost,
where I am found,
reaching from my center
to the world.
A Door at Notre Dame, Paris
ALL
the
distractions
of the world.
All the
Frippery
Frappery.
Spring birds
screaming Amor.
Frond
upon Frond
breaking into bud.
The world’s
architects
and designers
and tyrants,
all the dancing
and running
a round,
the blacksmith
in his forge
pounded out
the intricacies
of life.
Yet in the
very center of
It ALL
is Aslan,
the ring held
between His teeth,
obedience to the Father.
Knock and I shall open.
I am the very door.
Doors
On Essex flats
a stout wooden door, iron bound
opened on St Peter on the Wall
stone built
place of worship since 664
In Yorkshire I was handed a key
larger than my hand
heavy hewn from iron
which opened a door
into a medieval church
At Coventry a glass door
transparent
ruin reflecting
and saint embossed
opened upon a light-filled space
In South Africa
in a segregated township
simple garage doors parted
to reveal
a tin-walled chapel
each door opened
on a space beyond time
on shared faith
on love
Once a simple couple
pushed open a wooden door
or perhaps lifted
a dusty screen
and stepped into a stable
Time became eternity
Faith sprang anew
Love was there
Love was there
In the centre of the garden there is He
holding fast the bundled line of time.
The tension of his future and his past
held perfect by eternal central sign.
Reach forth to lift the ring he offers free
to those who take their courage in their hand;
He asks no more that they should quietly wait:
He opens to the ones who faithful stand.
I will knock to hear the echo call
within the house that men have built so tall,
who ask that He be there among their throng,
who lift one voice to raise salvation song
and bid me enter rest and sleep again:
after ardent, arduous journey’s pain
Door
To know the way in
to remember the door is there
does not make the journey
less arduous.
The night is still long.
The dark wood presses in on all sides.
Pray for compassion.
Pray for light.
Don’t forget the path is ever before you.
Don’t forget the ones who have gone before.
When you arrive
remember
you have to knock.
I wonder trying each pathway
the path of home ownership
the path of expensive clothing
the path of marriage
the path of motherhood
the path of success
Yet somehow these paths only lead me back outside away from Him
But when I seek Him I try a different way
the path of humility
the path of service
the path of patience
the path of love
I move toward the Spirit on these paths closer to the inside
The Spirit speaks louder and I am carried
Sometimes I don’t want to listen
I run to the outside again
Yet the Spirit always brings me back again when I cry
MORE
The Guardian of the Door
studied me with whimsical wisdom
as I loitered on the Threshold.
“I don’t know,” I said,
the way in is
so narrow,
so small.”
“Ah,” said He,
“That is only because you are too much.”
“I don’t know, I said,
“the inside must be
so limited,
so confining.”
“Ah,” said He,
“do you not know that the inside is always more than the outside?”
So I became less,
And I went through,
And the inside was so much more than the outside.
“So I became less” – my favorite line… Very nice.
The wisdom of fractals
is defined by the circle,
the only whole
we recognize.
But the Creator of all
wholes includes holes,
knowing as we long to
that essential order
contains
chaos. To lift and rap
is less to hope for
than to respond to
a threshold.
Moving
dervishly
I travel ’round
this way,
that way…
in the sacred dance
to places I dared not go…
I go now
with opened eyes
with twirling feet
closer to edges
places I have never been
bridging the spaces
where I must be bold
to reach the next turning…
my heart beats fearfully
yet with joy and reckless
abandon,
at what may be
the next unknown edge,
the next turn in my
sacred dance that leads
ever closer to Your Door…
the apex is near
hands stretched out
anticipation is heady
with the Presence of You
the center of my life,
I need only open myself
to the place beyond,
dancing before You,
forever…
Open the door!
I must know the scratchiness of your face
and the warmth of your breath on the back of my neck
and more….
it is easy
I am a complicated being
in need of gentle touch
emotions swirl and swoosh
it isn’t complicated
Just
be the brave soul to follow
each and every tendril
and some day
with the right caress
all secrets will be revealed