to be explosively healed

This second week of April has been an absolutely crazy one!

I participated in two different prayer rooms, one of which I coordinated. I had an article posted on the 24-7 Ireland website. I handed in two of my four final assignments, one of which was pretty much entirely written between Tuesday afternoon and Wednesday morning.

So, I'm a bit behind with my poetry month project. This week's poem is another that I've posted about before:

They say that for years Belfast was backwards

and it's great now to see some progress.

So I guess we can look forward to taking boxes

from the earth. I guess that ambulances

will leave the dying back amidst the rubble

to be explosively healed. Given time,

one hundred thousand particles of glass

will create impossible patterns in the air

before coalescing into the clarity

of a window. Through which, a reassembled head

will look out and admire the shy young man

taking his bomb from the building and driving home.

~ Alan Gillis

This week I've had several conversations about the Troubles with different groups of people. Some who were retelling stories they heard from their parents. Some who grew up in the midst of it all. Some, those who were my age, caught in between the two perspectives.

There was a great program on the BBC this week about the time that Mother Teresa and a few of her Sisters lived in West Belfast. They were there for about 18 months during the height of the troubles, in the early 70s. It's a very different thing to read about horrific things than it is to see them on tv.

Anyway, all of that to say that this poem in some way expresses the kinds of prayers that I've been praying for Belfast. That the Lord would bring healing and set things back to rights again.

whatever a sun will always sing

I love to memorise things, especially poetry. And it's been a long time since I've done so. April is National Poetry Month (in the US anyway) and I usually like to mark it in someway. This year I'm hoping to memorise a new poem, or refresh an old one I've forgotten, each week. The first week is my favourite poem which I've posted here before but for some reason have never memorised. It's by my favourite poet, e.e. cummings. I've had a hard time focusing and concentrating the last few weeks. I'm also hoping that the stillness, repetitiveness, and the focus inherit in memorising will have a positive affect on my brain function in other areas as well. My academic writing and overall sanity could really use the help!

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in

my heart)i am never without it(anywhere

i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done

by only me is your doing,my darling)

i fear

no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want

no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)

and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant

and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows

(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud

and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows

higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)

and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart

Ode to Saturday Morning

How do I love you? Let me count the ways:

I love you because I do not have to beat the Sun out of bed.

I love you for scrambled eggs and toast and tea, eaten leisurely.

I love you for impromptu dance parties as the day begins.

I love you for blog and flicker perusals in my pyjamas.

I love you for Uno tournaments and Pickwick Papers.

I love you for knitting and online TV.

I love you for all the cleaning and tidying yet to come.

And when this weekend ends I will but love you better Monday morning.

i laughed when i saw him in spite of myself

It was snowing and I was all dressed up in Christmassy clothes and I just couldn't resist! Don't mind the poor webcamera work or how big it makes my nose look!

progress

They say that for years Belfast was backwards

and it's great now to see some progress.

So I guess we can look forward to taking boxes

from the earth. I guess that ambulances

will leave the dying back amidst the rubble

to be explosively healed. Given time,

one hundred thousand particles of glass

will create impossible patterns in the air

before coalescing into the clarity

of a window. Through which, a reassembled head

will look out and admire the shy young man

taking his bomb from the building and driving home.

~ Alan Gillis

carefully everywhere descending

somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond

any experience,your eyes have their silence:

in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,

or which i cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look easily will unclose me

though i have closed myself as fingers,

you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens

(touching skilfully,mysteriously)her first rose

or if you wish to close me,i and

my life will shut very beautifully,suddenly,

as when the heart of this flower imagines

the snow carefully everywhere descending;

nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals

the power of your intense fragility:whose texture

compels me with the colour of its countries,

rendering death and forever with each breathing

(i do not know what it is about you that closes

and opens;only something in me understands

the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)

nobody,not even the rain,has such small hands

~e.e. cummings

snow in Ireland

"Suppose we did our work like the snow, quietly, quietly leaving nothing out."

~ Wendell Berry

for Lacy

a perfect poem for the ending of a year

~ e.e. cummings

We must not portray you in king's robes,

you drifting mist that brought forth the morning.

Once again from the old paintboxes

we take the same gold for scepter and crown

that has disguised you through the ages.

Piously we produce our images of you

till they stand around you like a thousand walls.

And when our hearts would simply open,

our fervent hands hide you.

~Rainer Maria Rilke

more women should dress like us

So two weekends ago I visited my youngest sister Lacy in Tennessee where she goes to college. We had a great weekend. On Friday we went into Chattanooga and explored the city a bit. Fabulous independent bookstore where I found a copy of Pablo Neruda's Love Poems and Lacy found a wonderful little journal with birch trees. We saw The Proposal which was entirely predictable, but still enjoyable. We had great salads at Panera for dinner then crossed The Walnut Street Bridge for some ice cream from Clumpy's. The sunset from the bridge was beautiful and we just sat and enjoyed the evening. We walked past a man who said to us, "Good evening girls. Ya'll look great. More women should dress like you." We decided this must be because of our impeccable fashion sense and not because he thought we looked slutty. Sunset from the Tennessee River

Lacy

The Walnut Street Bridge

Sisters

On Saturday we went hiking in the Cherokee National Forest which was an adventure! The first half hour or so was fine, just following the trail and crossing the stream on rocks and fallen logs a couple times. Then we had to climb up the side of the mountain. That's when it got a bit interesting. As much as I love trail walking scrambling through the brush and decaying leaves full of large insects and possibly snakes is not my favorite thing. We made it down to our destination, a beautiful waterfall where we had lunch and soaked up the day and Lacy swam in the pool at the base for a while. (A short while as it was VERY cold.) When we decided to head back was when the fun really began. Lacy couldn't find the trail. You loose it on the way in and then have to climb back up to where you leave it to head back out. We were scrambling up and down and across the side of the mountain for a good 15 minutes when we came across an army back pack that had been lost or dropped or something. It had been there for a week or maybe less. Animals had gotten into it and strewn the contents. Prescription medicine, tins of food, a large package of ivory soap. And a machete. That was slightly disconcerting as we were half expecting to stumble on a body or hear the weak cries of an injured soldier. Anyway, I got tired of going back to the waterfall to start again and pushed ahead, blazing a trail in roughly the right direction. After a few minutes Lacy, who was lower down than me, called out, "I found the real trail!" Which was a huge relief to both of us! The rest of the day was taken up with snow cones and movies and easy dinners.

Giant millipedes were everywhere!

Lacy swimming in the pool.

Sisters

The waterfall and me

Staring up at the sky... This was my view!

The Waterfall

Snail and mushroom on moss

On Sunday we meandered our way to Atlanta where I caught a plane to Jacksonville, Florida. I'll be here until the 30th of July. So far, we're having a blast.

praise song for the day

On Easter Sunday my church, a non-denominational church planted by an Anglican church in London, shared a service with the congregation with whom we share a building. This church is Greater Fellowship Missionary Baptist Church, an African-American church. The theme of the morning was Reconciliation. It was a powerful and emotional experience. Our band combined with the full gospel choir to lead worship. The pastors tag-teamed the sermon. Much was said about the racial issues in the south of America. All I could think of was the sectarian issues in Belfast.

Truly, reconciliation is a universal theme. Each and every human being stands in need of reconciliation. First with God. This is what Easter is all about. "God was in Christ reconciling us to himself." Then with each other. This is the good news of Christianity. That God wants to restore our relationships, all of our relationships.

I was moved during President Obama's inauguration by the poem written and read by Elizabeth Alexander, Praise Song for the Day. I purchased a copy of it recently. Now seems a fitting time to share it:

Each day we go about our business,
walking past each other, catching each other's
eye or not, about to speak or speaking.

All about us is noise. All about us is
noise and bramble, thorn and din, each
one of our ancestors upon our tongues.

Someone is stitching up a hem, darning
a hole in a uniform, patching a tire,
repairing the things in need of repair.

Someone is trying to make music somewhere,
with a pair of wooden spoons on an oil drum,
with cello, boom box, harmonica, voice.

A woman and her son wait for the bus.
A farmer considers the changing sky.
A teacher says, Take out your pencils. Begin.

We encounter each other with words, words
spiny or smooth, whispered or declaimed,
words to consider, reconsider.

We cross dirt roads and highways that mark
the will of some one and then others, who said
I need to see what's on the other side.

I know there's something better down the road.
We need to find a place where we are safe.
We walk into that which we cannot yet see.

Say it plain: that many have died for this day.
Sing the names of the dead who brought us here,
who laid the train tracks, raised the bridges,

picked the cotton and the lettuce, built
brick by brick the glittering edifices
they would then keep clean and work inside of.

Praise song for struggle, praise song for the day.
Praise song for every hand-lettered sign,
the figuring-it-out at kitchen tables.

Some live by love thy neighbor as thyself,
others by first do no harm or take no more
than you need. What if the mightiest word is love?

Love beyond marital, filial, national,
love that casts a widening pool of light,
love with no need to pre-empt grievance.

In today's sharp sparkle, this winter air,
any thing can be made, any sentence begun.
On the brink, on the brim, on the cusp,

praise song for walking forward in that light.

an ambitious project

Tomorrow is April 1st. April fools day. Also the first day of National Poetry Month. I have decided that this year I'm going to try and work my way through 1,000 Years of Irish Poetry ~ The Gaelic and Anglo-Irish Poets from Pagan Times to the Present. Present in this case is used loosely as the book was compiled in 1947. Wish me luck!

I am, besides, the only one
Who can be bright without the sun.
~Elizabeth Barrett Browning

I can hear your voice

whispering

As the sea roars

and splashes all around me

I can feel your soft

caress

As the sun warms my back

and the wind teases my hair

The cool, clear water

trapped

Between the rocks

Mirrors my smile

as you smile through the clouds

My soul is at rest in the

thundering

The sea-spray

sprinkles me with joy

I love it here

Because

I can hear you

seamus heaney seemed appropriate

since I'm heading to Belfast today...

At Ardboe Point

Right along the lough shore
A smoke of flies
Drifts thick in the sunset.

They come shattering daintily
Against the windscreen,
The grill and bonnet whisper

At their million collisions:
It is to drive through
A hail of fine chaff.

Yet we leave no clear wake
For they open and close on us
As the air opens and closes.

Tonight when we put out our light
To kiss between the sheets
Their just audible siren will go

Outside the window,
Their invisible veil
Weakening the moonlight still further,

And the walls will carry a rash
Of them, a green pollen.
They’ll have infiltrated our clothes by morning.

If you put one under a lens
You’d be looking at a pumping body
With such outsize beaters for wings

That this visitation would seem
More drastic than Pharaoh’s
I’m told their mosquitoes

But I’d need forests and swamps
To believe it
For these are our innocent, shuttling

Choirs, dying through
Their own live empyrean, troublesome only
As the last veil on a dancer.

turtle soup

A little nonsense for this foolish first day of April:

Beautiful Soup, so rich and green,
Waiting in a hot tureen!
Who for such dainties would not stoop?
Soup of the evening, beautiful Soup!
Soup of the evening, beautiful Soup!
Beau-ootiful Soo-oop!
Beau-ootiful Soo-oop!
Soo-oop of the e-e-evening,
Beautiful, Beautiful Soup!

Beautiful Soup! Who cares for fish,
Game, or any other dish?
Who would not give all else for two
Pennyworth only of beautiful Soup?
Beau-ootiful Soup!
Beau-ootiful Soup!
Soo-oop of the e-e-evening,
Beautiful, beauti-FUL SOUP!
-Lewis Carroll

And, I would be very happy to sing it for you next time I see you! (My own tune and everything)

nothing gold can stay

Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf,
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day,
Nothing gold can stay.

-Robert Frost

just wondering

My thoughts have been full of poetry lately. Some nights I haven't been able to sleep for thinking of it. If I had my books here I'd be reading Carl Sandburg or E.E. Cummings. As it is I've been trying to lull myself to sleep reciting the bits I have memorized.
What is it in me that longs for life to be like a dream? Full of poetic phrases and romantic imagery? How can I harness the positive, creative side of that while still keeping my feet planted firmly on the ground? How can I live a life that calls dreams into reality without retreating into fancy and imagination?
This is the lesson I want to learn next. These are the questions I'm seeking out.

a longing

I spin and twirl
my journey held in place
by an unseen hand

my deep, dear silence
is broken by whispers
I become unsettled

a knowing presses on me
something is missing
I cry for the moon

Someone is Hearing the Outcry

Human beings suffer.
They torture one another.
They get hurt and get hard.
No poem or play or song
Can fully right a wrong
Enflicted and endured.

History says, Don't hope
On this side of the grave,
But then, once in a lifetime
The longed for tidal wave
Of justice can rise up
And hope and history rhyme.

So hope for a great sea-change
On the far side of revenge.
Believe that a farther shore
Is reachable from here.
Believe in miracles
And cures and healing wells.

Call miracle self-healing,
The utter self-revealing
Double take of feeling.
If there's fire on the mountain
And lightning and storm
And a god speaks from the sky

That means someone is hearing
The outcry and the birth-cry
Of new life at its term.
It means once in a lifetime
That justice can rise up
And hope and history rhyme.

from The Cure at Troy
by Seamus Heaney