Visit the Abbey of the Arts online retreat platform to access your programs:

Invitation to Poetry: Harvesting the Inner Garden

Rhine grapes

Welcome to Poetry Party #79!

I select an image (the photo above is by Christine Valters Paintner) and suggest a theme/title and invite you to respond with your own poem. Scroll down and add it in the comments section below or join our Holy Disorder of Dancing Monks Facebook group and post there.

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!  (If you repost the photo, please make sure to include the credit link below it and link back to this post inviting others to join us).

We began this month with a  Community Lectio Divina practice with a parable from the Gospel of Mark and followed up with our Photo Party on the theme of the “harvesting the inner garden.” (You are most welcome to still participate).  We continue this theme in our Poetry Party this month. What are continuing to discover about your own inner harvesting?

You can post your poem either in the comment section below*or you can join our Holy Disorder of Dancing Monks Facebook group (with more than 2200 members!) and post there.

*Note: If this is your first time posting, or includes a link, your comment will need to be moderated before it appears. This is to prevent spam and should be approved within 24 hours.

You might also enjoy

Monk in the World Guest Post: Michael Moore

I am delighted to share another beautiful submission to the Monk in the World guest post series from the community. Read on for Wisdom Council member Michael Moore’s reflection on Sabbath and Silence. I am thankful to Christine and the Abbey community for this opportunity

Read More »

18 Responses

  1. The Wine of Forgiveness

    Slip into your gentle gown of humility
    Come to your banquet of life
    Come, savor its profusion of dishes
    The bitter
    The sweet
    The complex
    The simple
    Your place is set with love
    Surrounded by soul friends
    Lift the blood
    Of crushed grapes
    To a toast
    Then to your lips
    Sip the wine of forgiveness
    Harvested in your memories

  2. Diversity

    Made in the creator’s image
    Yet free to be
    Uniquely different
    Like grapes
    On a grapevine.

    Clinging to the source
    Yet free to be
    Moved by our own experiences.
    Each nurtured and weathered
    By life’s many joys and storms.

  3. When the shades of night descend
    I begin a spirit journey
    To the New Fire verandah
    Where chants of Paschal joy’
    Welcome the Morning Star
    And a candle is lit that shines in brilliance
    Usually I follow it into the chapel
    But last night the window became
    A luminous portal out over the ocean
    It’s shining was so magical
    I was absorbed into it
    And the melody of God is Love Forever
    Written on the adjacent wall
    High up hovering and shimmering
    The bunch of grapes became
    Good Wine overflowing and mystical
    Life and healing for the world…

    {I don’t know how to download the picture… go to Facebook – Hermitage in Big Sur}