Words on Wednesday: Advent

Advent

by Thomas Merton

Charm with your stainlessness these winter

  nights,

Skies, and be perfect! Fly vivider in the fiery dark,

  you quiet meteors,

And disappear.

You moon, be slow to go down,

This is your full!

The four white roads make off in silence

Towards the four parts of the starry universe.

Time falls like manna at the corners of the wintry

   earth.

We have become more humble than the rocks,

More wakeful than the patient hills.

Charm with your stainlessness these nights in

   Advent,

holy spheres,

While minds, as meek as beasts,

Stay close at home in the sweet hay;

And intellects are quieter than the flocks that feed

   by starlight.

Oh pour your darkness and your brightness over

   all our

solemn valleys,

You skies: and travel like the gentle Virgin,

Toward the planets' stately setting,

Oh white full moon as quiet as Bethlehem!

Advent Begins

Ready for Silence

Madeleine L'Engle


Then hear now the silence
He comes in the silence
in silence he enters
the womb of the bearer
in silence he goes to
the realm of the shadows
redeeming and shriving
in silence he moves from
the grave cloths, the dark tomb
in silence he rises
ascends to the glory
leaving his promise
leaving his comfort
leaving his silence

So, come now, Lord Jesus
Come in your silence
breaking our noising
laughter of panic
breaking this earth's time
breaking us breaking us
quickly Lord Jesus
make no long tarrying


Photo by Michal G

Words On Wednesday: Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving

Related Poem Content Details

BY TIM NOLAN

Thanks for the Italian chestnuts—with their 

tough shells—the smooth chocolaty 

skin of them—thanks for the boiling water—

itself a miracle and a mystery— 

thanks for the seasoned sauce pan 

and the old wooden spoon—and all

the neglected instruments in the drawer— 

the garlic crusher—the bent paring knife— 

the apple slicer that creates six

perfect wedges out of the crisp Haralson— 

thanks for the humming radio—thanks 

for the program on the radio

about the guy who was a cross-dresser— 

but his wife forgave him—and he 

ended up almost dying from leukemia—

(and you could tell his wife loved him 

entirely—it was in her deliberate voice)— 

thanks for the brined turkey—

the size of a big baby—thanks— 

for the departed head of the turkey— 

the present neck—the giblets

(whatever they are)—wrapped up as 

small gifts inside the cavern of the ribs— 

thanks—thanks—thanks—for the candles

lit on the table—the dried twigs— 

the autumn leaves in the blue Chinese vase—

thanks—for the faces—our faces—in this low light.

Photo by Dmitry Marochko

Words on Wednesday: "By The Rivers Dark"

I like this poem by Leonard Cohen, even if I don't really care for the recorded song. He passed away recently, and the world will be darker without his words. A young boy emailed him to ask what had inspired him to write his most famous song, "Hallelujah." His answer;  “I wanted to stand with those who clearly see G-d’s holy broken world for what it is, and still find the courage or the heart to praise it. You don’t always get what you want. You’re not always up for the challenge. But in this case — it was given to me. For which I am deeply grateful.”

It's timely that Cohen's songs are in the forefront of the public consciousness right now. Cohen recognizes darkness in the world and voices lament without giving in to despair. There's a gritty, raw honesty in his writing that we need. There's also faith, and at a time when many in our culture are turned off by Christianity, Cohen's Jewish faith is at least keeping God in the conversation. The song is based on Psalm 137. Cohen's faith language is always wrapped in humility, and that contributes to the appeal and challenges the caricatured depiction of faith so prevalent in secular culture.

"By The Rivers Dark" is inspired by Psalm 137. Titus Techura has written a good analysis of the poetry. He calls it "a song about trying to live with the darkness in the world that reveals the darkness in the soul that longs for God."

By The Rivers Dark

By Leonard Cohen (1934-2016)

By the rivers dark
I wandered on.
I lived my life
in Babylon.

And I did forget
My holy song:
And I had no strength
In Babylon.

By the rivers dark
Where I could not see
Who was waiting there
Who was hunting me.

And he cut my lip
And he cut my heart.
So I could not drink
From the river dark.

And he covered me,
And I saw within,
My lawless heart
And my wedding ring,

I did not know
And I could not see
Who was waiting there,
Who was hunting me.

By the rivers dark
I panicked on.
I belonged at last
to Babylon.

Then he struck my heart
With a deadly force,
And he said, ‘This heart:
It is not yours.’

And he gave the wind
My wedding ring;
And he circled us
With everything.

By the rivers dark,
In a wounded dawn,
I live my life
In Babylon.

Though I take my song
From a withered limb,
Both song and tree,
They sing for him.

Be the truth unsaid
And the blessing gone,
If I forget
My Babylon.

I did not know
And I could not see
Who was waiting there,
Who was hunting me.

By the rivers dark,
Where it all goes on;
By the rivers dark
In Babylon.

Photo by Teddy Kelley

Words on Wednesday

All Saints Day 
by Warren Leamon

A solitary tree atop a mountain rises

straight against a cloudless sky, and I remember

what the medieval painters would have seen:

a cross devoid of depth, flat from head to foot,

from nail to bloody nail, all lines of vision ending

in the innocent agony of a dying man.

We can’t say what they saw was mere distortion

(any serf knew well the depth of hill and sky);

nor can we say they saw no beauty in the world

(like us they loved lush color, reds and blues and yellows

split by smoke twisting up through icy air).

We can only say they knew too well the limits

of the flesh and caught on stark flat surfaces the truth

that haunts me now in the cold fields of November.

Leamon, W. "The Cold Fields of November." Sewanee Review, vol. 120 no. 1, 2012, pp. 30-33. Project MUSE,      

     doi:10.1353/sew.2012.0013.

Photo by Jon Flobrant.