Welcome to the Abbey’s 52nd Poetry Party!
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) and encourage others to come join the party! (permission is granted to reprint the image if a link is provided back to this post)
On Sunday, August 14th, I will draw a name at random from the participants and the winner will receive a copy of one of my two newest books The Artist’s Rule: Nurturing Your Creative Soul with Monastic Wisdom or Lectio Divina–The Sacred Arts: Transforming Words and Images into Heart-Centered Prayer.
For several years now I have been drawn to the possibility of living abroad again. During college I studied in Paris for a semester and while growing up, my father worked at the United Nations and we often traveled back to Vienna for summers where my grandparents lived. My father died fifteen years ago and in recent years I have made several journeys to Austria and Latvia, both countries where he grew up, as a part of a journey of healing our relationship and coming to a deeper understanding of his story, and therefore my own.
Last Christmas I traveled once more to Vienna and ended up in the hospital with a life-threatening condition and as terrifying as it all was, in these months since I can’t help but feel like it was also an experience of initiation toward something deeper in my life which I haven’t yet even been able to name. Now I am in the process of applying to regain the dual citizenship I once held with Austria as a child, another step on the journey. It feels important to claim that identity for myself in this way. It also opens up the possibility of living in Vienna in the future and makes work permits and health insurance so much simpler. So I continue to follow the call of this great journey and my husband and I are taking steps toward the possibility of a sabbatical abroad beginning next summer. Embracing this next part of the journey fills me with joy and anticipation, but also a healthy dose of fear and trembling. As Phil Cousineau wisely writes in The Art of Pilgrimage, “Ancient wisdom suggests if you aren’t trembling as you approach the sacred, it isn’t the real thing. The sacred, in its various guises as holy ground, art, or knowledge, evokes emotion and commotion.”
The photo for our Poetry Party is of a cairn I created from lava rocks while hiking across a caldera at Kilauea on the Big Island of Hawaii earlier this summer, one of the world’s most active volcanoes. Cairns are human-created piles of rocks left to mark trails and landmarks; they help to point the way. All great journeys require risk and sacrifice so the cairns of our lives help to remind us that we are moving in the right direction despite our doubts and fears. They may come in the form of synchronicities, or a sense of equanimity and joy, or an intuition that we are following a golden thread which leads us forward.
I invite you to write a poem about your own great journeys whether ones you have already taken or the ones you dream about. What are the markers along the way that remind you it is all worth it? What are the risks you must take to follow the loud beating of your heart?
44 Responses
SACRED PLACES
There are no paths
to sacred places,
only steps.
One step after the other
until one day
your turn around
and there you are –
a sacred place,
unto yourself
and like no other.
‘like’!
So true, Richard, and so elegantly written!
In so few words, this speaks volumes. Thank you for this poem.
Coracle
Buoy me up, O Lord
upon your mighty waters.
I journey not except
you move me.
I remain afloat
alone by your mercy
lest your deeps swallow me.
I abandon myself
to whatever place you beach me,
tossed upon your chosen shore.
Let me not break apart
upon hidden rocks.
May I remain a vessel
worthy of your service.
until you call me home
across eternal seas.
I have been working with images of water for several months. The reality of being on water has nourished my soul, from an anniversary sailing trip to a new boat and home on a lake. I continue to let my thirst for God draw me to the waters of life. Sally+
The path lies ahead of me
a trail, blazed by the one who has gone before
I follow in his example
marked by memorials of his experiences and adventures
the moisture of his sweat
the stains of his blood
these mark the path as surely as the rough stone mileposts
he is guided by the indomitable will
to give his own freedom
in order to mark the path
to life
The stony mileposts also have a path
a road that they have taken
beneath the surface, molten by heat
and fluctuating magnetic forces
they flow from place to place
unaware of the world above them
unaware of the concerns of men
until they are guided
through cracks and holes
into the cold, rigid world of the external
they give their own freedom
in order to mark the path
to life
Where will this path take me?
through loss and gain
into familial joy and tragedy
beside waters both still and turbulent
through the valley of the shadow of death
and into the green pastures
but mostly just
into the cold rigid world of the external
to give of my own surface freedoms
while following the path
of life
I’ve been resting, breathing, praying this image from Macrina Wiederkehr’s book, “Seven Sacred Pauses” for several months now. The image of my life journey as raising the chalice has been a Holy reminder of my own sacredness, my life as sacrament (my word for the year) – and the importance of me caring for me as I care for others on the journey. I’ve been wanting to write a nesting meditation using the following breath prayer and this prompted me to do so. Blessings all, Diane Braman
When I rise I lift high the chalice of my life!
When I rise I lift high the chalice. Of my life, O God, you are the One who fills me with renewed hope and ever-discerning purpose.
When I rise I lift high the chalice. Of my life, O God, you are the One who fills me. With renewed hope and ever-discerning purpose I breathe deeply of your Spirit in me and around me.
When I rise I lift high the chalice. Of my life, O God, you are the One who fills me. With renewed hope and ever-discerning purpose I breathe deeply of your Spirit. In me and around me you make your presence known in the world.
When I rise I lift high the chalice. Of my life, O God, you are the One who fills me. With renewed hope and ever-discerning purpose I breathe deeply of your Spirit. In me and around me you make your presence known. In the world O God, open my eyes, stir my heart, and lead me in the paths of Holy purpose that lead to sacred life for all your people. Praise be to you Lord Christ!
Diane, At each poetry party, I choose one or two poems that move me to keep. Yours is the first this time. I love how the lines change with different punctuation and the addition of just a few words. Absolutely beautiful!
Do You Hear Me?
Sometimes I wonder
when it’s silent
as I wait on you.
Are you there
Can you hear the stirrings of my heart
emptying out to you
I long for your voice
An answer
to assure me
that you are still a God
who raises the dead.
I need a Lazarus moment
for one I love
who has been dead for a while now
Lost and forgotten
by most
So I stand like the other mother
at the foot
with eyes looking up
And I ask
Do you hear me
Will you save him
bring him home
Waiting in faith
I believe
Help my unbelief
and set this child of yours free
Carol thank you for this tender poem, it touched my heart deeply.
This is a song, but it’s poetry, too!
The Great Unknown
When I had my kids, I traded sleep for love
Then “ordinary” became sweeter than I’d ever dreamed of
I traded certainty for the awful, Great Unknown.
When I went to school, I traded shallow for deep
Then I graduated, found a job I could keep
I traded certainty for the awful, Great Unknown.
The Great Unknown, how it calls to us
Like a siren in the night.
The Great Unknown, how we call to it
In the dark, a candle light
When I took that job, I traded time for money,
Then I left that job, and found the freedom felt funny.
I traded certainty for the awful, Great Unknown.
When I left that friend, an awkward circumstance,
I took a chance, and finally learned to dance
I traded certainty for the awful, Great Unknown.
The Great Unknown, how it yearns for us,
I think we yearn for it too.
The Great Unknown doesn’t say a word –
Speaks to me, speaks to you.
When I learn to swim, I’ll trade this fear for trust,
And when I die, as I know I must
I’ll trade certainty for the awful, Great Unknown.
The Great Unknown, how it waits for us.
It can wake us from our sleep.
The Great Unknown, as we wait for it
It’s the answer that deep cries out to deep.
It is the certainty of the awful, Great Unknown.
Cactus Juice
Peaceful feelings are elusive
But I’m glad for those that come
I wish my joys were more effusive
and daily life was much more fun
But even when I scrape through anger
or sadness drapes on shoes of lead
the “solid” me is not a stranger
the soul of me is not “unfed”
A freedom grows within my darkness
Small points of light that dance & glow
While dragging through this desert starkness
Cool trickling streams begin to flow
So on I walk as courage whispers
I may not run or leap with glee
I kneel to drink from deeper cisterns
I pray for faith that’s wild & free
This darker path is not my choosing
This broken way feels so imposed
I cling to what I fear I’m losing
This journey’s not what I supposed
And so my mind fills up with questions
My aching brain – it stews and fumes
Forgets to hear my hearts suggestions
The worst of worries it fast assumes
But when I slow into the silence
I feel the solid mountains singing
They hum a tune of fierce non-violence
Help me release where I’ve been clinging
O wash my feet in soulful waters
As desert vines begin to bloom
I sip the juice the cactus offers
And fall into a spacious room
Where beauty twines within my sorrow
And comfort glistens in my fear
Can’t solve the puzzles of tomorrow
But I can sense God’s presence here
Thank You, Life, for tender mercies
I Bless the stars that light my way
May “Wild Christ” shine in all these verses
And May I trust His Love today…..
Shelley – I recognize the landscape that you describe. I live there, too. Thank you for sharing your journey – it reads like a Psalm.
I agree with Deb. This does read like a Psalm, Shelley. Thank you for sharing it!
Thanks, Deb and Jason for your responses. Glad we can share the journey.
Thank you, Shelly! Beautiful!
Beautiful Shelley
Friday, February 06, 2009
Kinzua Road
Walk the Ellithorpe
Let’s go out .
Hills invisible beneath the trees
live in both of our memories
The little spring
The field at the top of the hill.
It’s winter now
the snow and the ice
rendering the woods
closed and inhospitable.
But we’ve done that before
haven’t we?
Walked the woods,
troubled and fearful
without trust in
anything like a good outcome
a friendly Universe
A God who looks our way kindly.
Your defiant heart meant
oblivion at the end of the road —
Was this the aspiration you left me?
And still
and yet…
The rock beside the spring–
I’ll meet you there.
What is forgiveness anyway
between such as we
who have forgiven
again and again
but have long memories ?
What is forgiveness?
Just to sit in the forest
by the spring
and drink
and observe
the companionable
non-accusation
of the snow.
I hear the train whistle blow. It harmonizes with the steady vesper chant of crickets. I wonder where the train is headed, and I long to be aboard.
To hear and feel the clickety-clack while sipping a Martini in the bar car will bring on old dreams of prosperity and a longing for sleep. I wonder where the train is headed, and I long to be aboard.
The bluish smoke of a Montecristo ascends, swirling, then fades away. Like the train whistle. I think maybe I prefer the crickets’ soft concert. I wonder where I am headed.
the last great sigh of summer
blows a path
through the other side
of perhaps
This speaks beautifully to me as I contemplate my new “perhaps”. Thank you.
“other side of perhaps” is brilliant!