A Mealtime Prayer

Lord, we thank you for this food
(We say this with no sorrow) —
May it bring strength for this day’s good,
Not storage for tomorrow.

Amen.

In the Doctor’s Office

What time I wait
Between the push and wail
Of this quotidian race,
While someone else,
Determined not to fail,
Hurries to show his face:

This waiting time, I say,
Affords me space
To simply sit,
Appreciate the grace
That lets me be
One person, me —
At this one time,
In this one place.

Did you?

In the grand scheme of things, the simple ways are best.
There is no magic word, no litmus test.

Did you believe, as best you could, that love will find a way?
Did you keep hope alive just for a day?
Did you see light in someone’s eyes?
Did you run as for a prize?
Did you keep going, just to keep your word?
Did you keep faith with friends, if not the Lord?

If you can love, then you know how to pray.
And this is life eternal, now, today.

Age, Youth, Death, Renewal, Eternity?

This brief journey
the flickering, sputtering, guttering light that is our life
(our awakening, our delight, our terror, our pain,
our hope, our loss, our gain,
in which we glimpse, besmudged, through squinted eyes,
yet solid, real, bright, hard and clear,
A world whose beauty takes us by surprise
sometimes in wonder, or in fear) —
This journey,
told in days and years,
is just the merest hint
the barest glint
of a reflection
of the vast unfolding
which will lead us
to the beginning
of our eternal day.

waking and dreaming: The Via Negativa

Wanting to pay attention, falling asleep at the wheel
Is the wheel really turning, or just what is this deal?
I opened my eyes, I swear I did, just a moment ago
But visions of sugarplums dance just where there only was cold and snow.

The cold light of day, the bright morning star — what is it that blinds my sight?
How can I know how near or far I am from the end of night?
Is that hope up ahead, the light of day, a break in the clouds and rain?
Or is it instead the menacing rush of a deadly approaching train?

“Open my eyes, that I may see” — how earnestly, often we pray;
But what is the truth that my eyes show to me? Am I right to feel dismay?
I want to pay attention to the world and what is real
But how can I shake the slumber? What now do I feel?

Listening, touching, being

I saw a soul pass by, and paused. Was that a cry?
Beneath the noise of argument, was that a sigh?
Stop, be still, I heard my spirit say; who know when I
Will see again this soul pass by this way?

The sighing soul, so quiet, fearful,
heard my silence, spoke
and paused,
fearing my voice would mock her pain;
I held quite still, as if to say
my presence was no joke
and watched the stillness, till she spoke again.

So gently, trembling, from the secret depths she rose;
The tender soul revealed the wounds she bore,
And let me reach, and touch, within the silence,
The beauty of her being,
Nothing more.

Fantasy and fun

Living a dream, living a lie—
What shall I choose as a story?
To reach a goal before I die
Or go down in flames of glory?

The Christ who gave abundant life,
and called us all to follow
Invites to joy, invites to strife —
Which of these two is hollow?

Today, I’ll live within the scope
Of privileges royal
But may I not forget the hope
To which I have been loyal.

I carry still within my breast
The poor, the foe, the friendless;
For their sake, too, today I rest
In pleasures full and endless.

To be beloved, with childlike glee
And loving now the days
May help me still more clearly see
the great Creator’s ways.

Holiday

I wish I could claim to have written this, because it says so many things so well. This poem was posted on Christmas day by a person whose words are often worth pondering.

There is some heartbreak on the happiest days
for people who are gone
who loved us and who we love still
and for the lovers
that love passed by


There is some heartbreak in the very best of days
getting up early or staying up late,
walking the streets of
waking houses with the lights coming on
and you can almost hear the oohs and aahs
and you forget, you forget
that you’re on the outside
pretending that you aren’t looking in


There is some heartbreak on the happiest days
for people we never got to know
but we hear in the back of our mind
a whisper that we should know them
or should remember,
should remember people in a war zone
that isn’t their in-law’s house
people like us bringing down
memories from the top of the closet
and there are never as many
memories as you thought there were
never as many memories as you wanted


There is some heartbreak on the happiest days
a sweet secret of a heartbreak that we share
a sweet secret of a heartbreak for someone we love
and that secret makes us smile
for someone who isn’t there

~ XineAnn

In a moment of stillness

We die to the living,
and live with the dead,

and much more is understood
than can be said.

So we, ensouled as lumps of clay,
Spirits enfleshed  for now, today,
Embracing every brief delight
Releasing, then, into the night,

Dance, we dance, through all the strife
That keeps our souls apart,
We mend within the dance of life
These holes within our heart.

I learned to love

I learned to love by failing
for more than thirty years:
My efforts unavailing
Persisted through my fears.

I learned to love by losing,
By giving up the ground;
I learned to love by choosing
To keep what I have found.

I learned to love by staying
When hope for love was lost;
I learned to love by praying
And counting up the cost.

I learned to love by seeing
That love is more than life.
I learned to love by being
A husband to my wife.

The Tyger

Poet, artist and visionary William Blake was born 250 years ago today.

THE TYGER (from Songs Of Experience)

By William Blake

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright 

In the forests of the night, 

What immortal hand or eye

Could frame thy fearful symmetry? 

 

In what distant deeps or skies 

Burnt the fire of thine eyes? 

On what wings dare he aspire? 

What the hand dare sieze the fire? 

 

And what shoulder, & what art.

 Could twist the sinews of thy heart? 

And when thy heart began to beat, 

What dread hand? & what dread feet?

 

 What the hammer? what the chain?

 In what furnace was thy brain? 

What the anvil? what dread grasp 

Dare its deadly terrors clasp? 

 

When the stars threw down their spears, 

And watered heaven with their tears, 

Did he smile his work to see? 

Did he who made the Lamb make thee? 

 

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright 

In the forests of the night, 

What immortal hand or eye 

Dare frame thy fearful symmetry? 

 

1794

If

Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936) If– (”Brother Square-Toes”–Rewards and Fairies) If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you, If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, But make allowance for their doubting too; If you can wait and not be tired by waiting, Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies, Or being hated, don’t give way to hating, And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:   If you can dream–and not make dreams your master; If you can think–and not make thoughts your aim; If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster And treat those two impostors just the same; If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools, Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken, And stoop and build ‘em up with worn-out tools:   If you can make one heap of all your winnings And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss, And lose, and start again at your beginnings And never breathe a word about your loss; If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew To serve your turn long after they are gone, And so hold on when there is nothing in you Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on!”   If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue, Or walk with Kings–nor lose the common touch, If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you, If all men count with you, but none too much; If you can fill the unforgiving minute With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run, Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it, And–which is more–you’ll be a Man, my son!

 

On this day of Thanksgiving

I tried to find some words to say, but Lord, I am not able

To offer thanks the proper way, not just for food and table,

Not only for the friends I’ve gained, along this life’s great highway

Nor just for joys of wealth attained, or work that I’ve done my way.  

Beyond all this, O God of love, on this day of thanksgiving

I thank you for the ways you prove that life is still worth living.

And thanks for every ache and pain in hip and knee and shoulder,

For though it hurts, I can’t complain: You’re letting me get older!

In the rain

In the rain I do not feel inspired, 

My brain and body just won’t go;

Indeed, in rain I just feel tired.

Try as I must, my pace is slow.

 

Still, rain or not, I must awaken;

Must, under overhanging grey,

Not leave my lovely ones forsaken.

Stand up, step out, and meet my day.

 

This dreary rain will quietly feed

In preparation for the sun 

The thirsty earth, the slumbering seed, 

For busyness not yet begun.

 

So I will gain, from these grey showers 

Tomorrow’s food, tomorrow’s flowers.

 

Sun and Earth

Sunshine mists away the dew, 

brightens the path; I think of you.

Wish you were here, along with me, 

to contemplate the fading tree.

 

A year gone by of tasks undone

Swept clean, unheeded, by the sun,

He wheels in his appointed way

To mark the start and end of day.

 

The sun arises, oversees

The bustle of our struggle and toil

While, effortless, he works to please

The earth, the wind, the sea, the soil,

 

Amused at all our scrabbling rage

Whereby we steal each other’s good,

While sun and earth, with wisdom sage, 

Provide us all we need for food.