White-Eyes

In winter 
   all the singing 
      is in the tops of the trees 
         where the wind-bird

with its white eyes
   shoves and pushes 
      among the branches.
         Like any of us 

he wants to go to sleep,
   but he's restless—
      he has an idea,
         and slowly it unfolds 

from under his beating wings
   as long as he stays awake.
      But his big, round music, after all,
         is too breathy to last.

So, it's over.
   In the pine-crown
      he makes his nest,
         he's done all he can.

I don't know the name of this bird,
   I only imagine his glittering beak
      tucked in a white wing
         while the clouds—

which he has summoned
   from the north— 
     which he has taught
         to be mild, and silent— 

thicken, and begin to fall
   into the world below
      like stars, or the feathers
         of some unimaginable bird

that loves us,
   that is asleep now, and silent— 
      that has turned itself
         into snow.

--Mary Oliver (1935-2019), American poet, teacher, and writer

Geodes

You can't always tell one from another 
And it's best not to judge a book by its tattered cover 
I have found when I tried or looked deeper inside 
What appears unadorned might be wondrously formed 
You can't always tell but sometimes you just know 

'Round here we throw geodes in our gardens 
They're as common as the rain or corn silk in July 
Unpretentious browns and grays the stain of Indiana clay, 
They're what's left of shallow seas glacial rock and mystery, 
And inside their shines a crystal bright as promise 

All these things that we call familiar, 
Are just miracles clothed in the commonplace 
You'll see it if you try in the next stranger's eyes, 
God walks around in muddy boots, 
sometimes rags and that's the truth, 
You can't always tell, but sometimes you just know 

Some say geodes are made from pockets of tears, 
Trapped away in small places for years upon years 
Pressed down and transformed, 'til the true self was born, 
And the whole world moved on like the last notes of a song, 
A love letter sent without return address 

You can't always tell one from another 
And it's best not to judge a book by it's tattered cover 
Now I don't open them to see folks 'round here just like me, 
We have come to believe there's hidden good in common things 
You can't always tell but sometimes you just know 
You can't always tell but sometimes you just know 

 --Carrie Newcomer (1958- ), American folk singer-songwriter


 

Snow Day

Today we woke up to a revolution of snow, 
its white flag waving over everything,
the landscape vanished,
not a single mouse to punctuate the blankness,
and beyond these windows

the government buildings smothered,
schools and libraries buried, the post office lost
under the noiseless drift,
the paths of trains softly blocked,
the world fallen under this falling.

In a while, I will put on some boots
and step out like someone walking in water,
and the dog will porpoise through the drifts,
and I will shake a laden branch
sending a cold shower down on us both.

But for now I am a willing prisoner in this house,
a sympathizer with the anarchic cause of snow.
I will make a pot of tea
and listen to the plastic radio on the counter,
as glad as anyone to hear the news

that the Kiddie Corner School is closed,
the Ding-Dong School, closed. 
the All Aboard Children’s School, closed, 
the Hi-Ho Nursery School, closed, 
along with—some will be delighted to hear—

the Toadstool School, the Little School,
Little Sparrows Nursery School,
Little Stars Pre-School, Peas-and-Carrots Day School
the Tom Thumb Child Center, all closed,
and—clap your hands—the Peanuts Play School. 

So this is where the children hide all day, 
These are the nests where they letter and draw,
where they put on their bright miniature jackets, 
 all darting and climbing and sliding, 
all but the few girls whispering by the fence.

And now I am listening hard
in the grandiose silence of the snow,
trying to hear what those three girls are plotting,
what riot is afoot,
which small queen is about to be brought down.

-- Billy Collins (1941- ), American poet and US poet laureate 2001-2003, from Sailing Alone Around the Room: New and Selected Poems, 2001

Ojibway Prayer

Grandfather,

Sacred One,

teach us love, compassion, and honor

that we may heal the earth

and heal each other.

--Ojibway Prayer

Blue Christmas prayer

 
Around us, O God, the singing can be heard: ‘Joy to the world…let heaven and nature sing.’ This season is to be one of hope eases our minds, when peace soothes our hearts, when love warms our souls, and when joy comes each morning.

But there are many who do not feel this joy. Some might try, others have given up trying. ‘Where is this joy for us?’ they ask. The world has found joy but some feel as if it has passed them by. Our minds are not at ease…we feel too much doubt. Our hearts are not at peace…there is too much to do. Our souls are not warmed…the chill of death is too troubling. Where, O God, can joy be found? We ask this as we come before you in prayer, opening ourselves to the possibility that hope, peace, joy, and love might still come to us.

We pray for the lonely, that they might find comfort in another’s touch.

We pray for the downtrodden, that they might find relief from their burdens.

We pray for those wrestling with depression, that a light of calm might bring them peace.

We pray for those dealing with stress, that they might find the courage to let go. 

We pray for the grief-stricken, that they might experience the newness of life that you bring.

May joy come to the world, O God, and may we grasp some of that. We do not pray for joy that is temporary or fleeting, but a joy that runs deep and sustains us even in moments of despair. We seek this joy in a season that can be less than joyful. O God, hear our prayer.

We wait for Emanuel, God With Us, to come into our hearts once again. May we experience your love in new ways as we in turn love each other. We pray this in the name of the One who is to come. Amen.

-- Jeffrey A. Nelson, aka coffeepastor, blogger and UCC pastor, posted on Philosophy Over Coffee. http://philosophyovercoffee.blogspot.ca/2005/12/blue-christmas-prayer.html

Trappists, Working

Now all our saws sing holy sonnets in this world of timber 
Where oaks go off like guns, and fall like cataracts, 
Pouring their roar into the wood’s green well. 

Walk to us, Jesus, through the wall of trees, 
And find us still adorers in these airy churches, 
Singing our other Office with our saws and axes. 
Still teach Your children in the busy forest, 
And let some little sunlight reach us, in our mental shades, 
   and leafy studies.
When time has turned the country white with grain 
And filled our regions with the thrashing sun, 

Walk to us, Jesus, through the walls of wheat 
When our two tractors come to cut them down: 
Sow some light winds upon the acres of our spirit, 
And cool the regions where our prayers are reapers, 
And slake us, Heaven, with Your living rivers.
                                                                            (1946)

--Thomas Merton (1915-1968) OCSO, American Trappist monk, priest, essayist, memoirist, and poet, from In the Dark Before Dawn: New Selected Poems, 2005. His feast day is today.

Ribblesdale

Earth, sweet Earth, sweet landscape, with leavés throng
And louchéd low grass, heaven that dost appeal
To, with no tongue to plead, no heart to feel;
That canst but only be, but dost that long—

Thou canst but be, but that thou well dost; strong
Thy plea with him who dealt, nay does now deal,
Thy lovely dale down thus and thus bids reel
Thy river, and o’er gives all to rack or wrong.

  And what is Earth’s eye, tongue, or heart else, where
Else, but in dear and dogged man?—Ah, the heir
To his own selfbent so bound, so tied to his turn, 
To thriftless reave both our rich round world bare
And none reck of world after, this bids wear
Earth brows of such care, care and dear concern.

--Gerard Manley Hopkins, SJ (1844-1889), English Jesuit priest and poet

Forest Sonnet, Whidbey Island

"Now, no matter, child, the name:
Sorrow's springs are the same.
No mouth had, no nor mind, expressed
What heart heard of, ghost guessed:
It is the blight man was born for,
It is Margaret you mourn for."

--from Spring and Fall, by Gerard Manley Hopkins

Here Sorrow springs and newborn Spring sorrows;
Their grief resolves in fiddleheads tomorrow.
The mournful poet sees the greening leaf
and vaults ahead to autumn's parting grief....

An anticipatory grief, so-called.
Here last year's leaves lie trodden, branch scraped-bald
From winter's remnant grip. But see, as Spring
Flushes first rosy throat, as thrushes sing

God's glory! Still, larks chirruping, skimming
The winds arise from southern vales, brimming
Their blessings upon the restive, waking Earth.
The forest floor will testify that birth

Sings from subsidence, converting death
God's gravid Spirit-- resurrection's breath.

--L. K. S., written after forest bathing while reading Hopkins, December 6, 2019

Spring and Fall

to a young child

MÁRGARÉT, áre you gríeving
Over Goldengrove unleaving?
Leáves, líke the things of man, you
With your fresh thoughts care for, can you?
Ah! As the heart grows older
It will come to such sights colder
By and by, nor spare a sigh
Though worlds of wanwood leafmeal lie;
And yet you will weep and know why.
Now, no matter, child, the name:
Sórrow’s spríngs áre the same.
No mouth had, no nor mind, expressed
What heart heard of, ghost guessed:
It ís the blight man was born for,
It is Margaret you mourn for.

--Gerard Manley Hopkins, SJ, English Jesuit priest and poet

My God, It's Full of Stars

          1. 

We like to think of it as parallel to what we know, 
Only bigger. One man against the authorities. 
Or one man against a city of zombies. One man 

Who is not, in fact, a man, sent to understand 
The caravan of men now chasing him like red ants 
Let loose down the pants of America. Man on the run.

Man with a ship to catch, a payload to drop, 
This message going out to all of space. . . . Though 
Maybe it’s more like life below the sea: silent, 

Buoyant, bizarrely benign. Relics 
Of an outmoded design. Some like to imagine 
A cosmic mother watching through a spray of stars, 

Mouthing yes, yes as we toddle toward the light, 
Biting her lip if we teeter at some ledge. Longing 
To sweep us to her breast, she hopes for the best 

While the father storms through adjacent rooms 
Ranting with the force of Kingdom Come, 
Not caring anymore what might snap us in its jaw. 

Sometimes, what I see is a library in a rural community. 
All the tall shelves in the big open room. And the pencils 
In a cup at Circulation, gnawed on by the entire population. 

The books have lived here all along, belonging 
For weeks at a time to one or another in the brief sequence 
Of family names, speaking (at night mostly) to a face,

A pair of eyes. The most remarkable lies. 


           2. 

Charlton Heston is waiting to be let in. He asked once politely. 
A second time with force from the diaphragm. The third time, 
He did it like Moses: arms raised high, face an apocryphal white. 

Shirt crisp, suit trim, he stoops a little coming in, 
Then grows tall. He scans the room. He stands until I gesture, 
Then he sits. Birds commence their evening chatter. Someone fires 

Charcoals out below. He’ll take a whiskey if I have it. Water if I don’t. 
I ask him to start from the beginning, but he goes only halfway back. 
That was the future once, he says. Before the world went upside down. 

Hero, survivor, God’s right hand man, I know he sees the blank
Surface of the moon where I see a language built from brick and bone.
He sits straight in his seat, takes a long, slow high-thespian breath,

Then lets it go. For all I know, I was the last true man on this earth. And: 
May I smoke? The voices outside soften. Planes jet past heading off or back.
Someone cries that she does not want to go to bed. Footsteps overhead.

A fountain in the neighbor’s yard babbles to itself, and the night air 
Lifts the sound indoors. It was another time, he says, picking up again. 
We were pioneers. Will you fight to stay alive here, riding the earth

Toward God-knows-where? I think of Atlantis buried under ice, gone
One day from sight, the shore from which it rose now glacial and stark.
Our eyes adjust to the dark. 


          3.

Perhaps the great error is believing we’re alone,

That the others have come and gone—a momentary blip—

When all along, space might be choc-full of traffic,

Bursting at the seams with energy we neither feel

Nor see, flush against us, living, dying, deciding,

Setting solid feet down on planets everywhere,

Bowing to the great stars that command, pitching stones 

At whatever are their moons. They live wondering 

If they are the only ones, knowing only the wish to know,

And the great black distance they—we—flicker in.


Maybe the dead know, their eyes widening at last, 

Seeing the high beams of a million galaxies flick on 

At twilight. Hearing the engines flare, the horns

Not letting up, the frenzy of being. I want to be

One notch below bedlam, like a radio without a dial. 

Wide open, so everything floods in at once.

And sealed tight, so nothing escapes. Not even time,

Which should curl in on itself and loop around like smoke.

So that I might be sitting now beside my father

As he raises a lit match to the bowl of his pipe

For the first time in the winter of 1959. 





          4.

In those last scenes of Kubrick’s 2001 
When Dave is whisked into the center of space, 
Which unfurls in an aurora of orgasmic light 
Before opening wide, like a jungle orchid 
For a love-struck bee, then goes liquid, 
Paint-in-water, and then gauze wafting out and off, 
Before, finally, the night tide, luminescent 
And vague, swirls in, and on and on. . . . 

In those last scenes, as he floats
Above Jupiter’s vast canyons and seas,
Over the lava strewn plains and mountains
Packed in ice, that whole time, he doesn’t blink. 
In his little ship, blind to what he rides, whisked 
Across the wide-screen of unparcelled time, 
Who knows what blazes through his mind? 
Is it still his life he moves through, or does 
That end at the end of what he can name?

On set, it’s shot after shot till Kubrick is happy, 
Then the costumes go back on their racks 
And the great gleaming set goes black.


          5.
When my father worked on the Hubble Telescope, he said 
They operated like surgeons: scrubbed and sheathed
In papery green, the room a clean cold, a bright white.

He’d read Larry Niven at home, and drink scotch on the rocks,
His eyes exhausted and pink. These were the Reagan years,
When we lived with our finger on The Button and struggled

To view our enemies as children. My father spent whole seasons
Bowing before the oracle-eye, hungry for what it would find.
His face lit-up whenever anyone asked, and his arms would rise

As if he were weightless, perfectly at ease in the never-ending
Night of space. On the ground, we tied postcards to balloons
For peace. Prince Charles married Lady Di. Rock Hudson died.

We learned new words for things. The decade changed.

The first few pictures came back blurred, and I felt ashamed
For all the cheerful engineers, my father and his tribe.
The second time, The optics jibed. We saw to the edge of all there is— 

So brutal and alive it seemed to comprehend us back.

--Tracy K. Smith (1972- ), US poet laureate 2017-2019, from Life on Mars, 2011