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

Invitation to Poetry: Holy Waiting

Augustine Baron - Photo Party - Holy Waiting

Welcome to Poetry Party #73!

button-poetryI select an image (*photo above by Augustine Baron) 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 Visio Divina practice with a beautiful piece of art from Mary Southard and followed up with our Photo Party on the theme of “Holy Waiting.” (You are most welcome to still participate).  We continue this theme in our Poetry Party this month.

An essential aspect of listening for what is being birthed through us is waiting, watching, listening, being. The photo above, shared by fellow monk in the world Augustine Baron at this month’s Photo Party, shimmers with the sacredness of ordinary moments of waiting. Waiting on a bench for the bus to come, waiting at the dentist’s office, waiting in line at the grocery store, waiting for the results of a medical test, waiting to hear about a new job. Write a poem which celebrates these ordinary kinds of holy waiting.

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 1000 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: Sharon Dawn Johnson

I am delighted to share another beautiful submission to the Monk in the World guest post series from the community. Read on for Sharon Dawn Johnson’s reflection Yearning For Second Spring. Seasonal Thresholds Aroused at first light, the sun peeps over nearby urban rooftops as

Read More »

21 Responses

  1. As I wait on God
    I am listened to
    With a silence
    That penetrates
    To the depth of my being
    And silences me
    So that I listen
    From the depth of my heart.

  2. Life thrives, teems with creation
    Microorganisms living their lives
    Flora and fauna pursuing their life cycle
    Up to the world’s end, hard and gray
    Supporting the bench where people rest
    Oblivious to the world beneath them

  3. Waiting in Stillness

    After David Whyte’s poem, Faith

    I want to write about stillness,
    about the way a bungee jumper plunges
    over the edge
    head first
    arms outstretched
    in that universal gesture of surrender,

    and how, as the rope pulls taut,
    for just one moment
    the jumper is
    weightless
    waiting
    before ascending again.

    I want to write about the pause
    between a wave washing into shore
    and washing out again,

    about the gap between the in breath
    and the out breath
    which, in India, the yogis call Kumbhak.

    I want to write about starlings,
    how they sweep across the sky
    in perfect unison
    pause at some invisible border
    then double-back
    in a sudden tide of black feathers.

    Inside these small sanctuaries,
    these places of stillness, of waiting,
    there is no rushing
    no pressing ahead
    no goals, no destinations
    no need to begin something
    no need to complete anything
    there is just
    the Universe
    pausing for thought.

  4. Nested Meditation
    Evening

    Empty hammock.

    Empty hammock
    Gently swinging.

    Empty hammock
    Gently swinging
    Waiting for me.

    Empty hammock
    Gently swinging
    Waiting for me
    Calling me to come.

    Empty hammock
    Gently swinging
    Waiting for me
    Calling me to come
    Enjoy precious moments.

    Empty hammock
    Gently swinging
    Waiting for me
    Calling me to come
    Enjoy precious moments
    Reviewing this day.

    Empty hammock
    Gently swinging
    Calling me to come
    Enjoy precious moments
    Reviewing this day
    Thanking God.

    jan jett

  5. “O, Come! O, Come!”
    though I know You are here now
    in this aching world and deep within my wounded self.

    What I feel and know are at odds.
    I feel the dark descending…
    empty, lonely, void, silent.

    Yet what I know is pregnant darkness:
    In the darkness of the earth, hidden, a seed germinates.
    In the darkness of the womb, hidden, a baby grows.

    I long for that which I already possess,
    that which is already infused in every cell of my body
    and every atom of the Universe.
    Yet, when the dark times on Earth and within me come,
    I forget…I forget.

    Remind me…
    Re – mind me…
    change my thoughts, my assumptions,
    my habits, my heart.
    Let me turn my face to You
    and let Your Light shine in my darkness.
    Let us become the Light shining.