On the tiny limestone island
an angel buzzes to Gobnait
in a dream, disrupts her plans,
sends her in search of nine white deer.
She wanders for miles across
sea and land until at last
they appear and rather than
running toward them
she falls gently to wet ground,
sits in silence as light crawls across sky,
lets their long legs approach
and their soft, curious noses surround her.
Breathing slowly, she slides back
onto grass and clover and knows
nothing surpasses this moment,
a heaven of hooves and dew.
Is there a place for each of us,
where we no longer yearn to be elsewhere?
Where our work is to simply soften,
wait, and pay close attention?
She smiles as bees gather eagerly
around her too, wings humming softly
as they collect essence of wildflowers,
transmuting labor into gold.
-- Christine Valters Paintner, Benedictine oblate, teacher, spiritual director, poet, artist, and Abbess of the online Abbey of the Arts.
February 12 is the feast day of St. Gobnait of Ballyvourney, the Irish patron saint of beekeepers (along with St. Ambrose and St. Valentine).
in a dream, disrupts her plans,
sends her in search of nine white deer.
She wanders for miles across
sea and land until at last
they appear and rather than
running toward them
she falls gently to wet ground,
sits in silence as light crawls across sky,
lets their long legs approach
and their soft, curious noses surround her.
Breathing slowly, she slides back
onto grass and clover and knows
nothing surpasses this moment,
a heaven of hooves and dew.
Is there a place for each of us,
where we no longer yearn to be elsewhere?
Where our work is to simply soften,
wait, and pay close attention?
She smiles as bees gather eagerly
around her too, wings humming softly
as they collect essence of wildflowers,
transmuting labor into gold.
-- Christine Valters Paintner, Benedictine oblate, teacher, spiritual director, poet, artist, and Abbess of the online Abbey of the Arts.
February 12 is the feast day of St. Gobnait of Ballyvourney, the Irish patron saint of beekeepers (along with St. Ambrose and St. Valentine).
Image: Stained glass window of St. Gobnait, Honan Chapel, Cork, by Harry Clarke, 1914.
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