III.Speaking of DeathInto the box of the black-eyed menace I go,Its coffin lid, like heaven itself, slammed shut.Steep cliffs loom large at each of its four wallsWhere vultures wait their turn in silence.I nod off.  Who knows whether, if I sayI've come here seeking life and wisdom,With these gifts, or with neither, or with someKind of hellish madness, I will return?  NoMatter.  I follow

II.New Day, New LifeIt was in the sky that the event occurred.  A soundLike that of buffalo stampeding over stone pavementWas shaken into life by the steady hammeringOf a wet wind pressing in over stormy seas.  BehemothClouds crawled forward on their bellies, smearingGray shadows along the ground in shapes resemblingThat of a mittened hand, its one, fat finger pointing westTo where

As those of you who read this blog may have noticed, I've discontinued the practice of attaching interpretive comments to my poems.  I felt too uncomfortable doing it, wanting the poem to speak for itself.But it has been suggested to me that, following each poem, I conclude with a simple question, something to prime the pump (to coin a phrase) of reflection for the reader.  It seemed like

III.A Boy's Song of SpringI want to laugh and sing, to tell riddles or share with youThe dream that woke me this morning, feeding sunlight to my eyes.I want to mix my words with the clatter of a bluejay's boxcar as it passes,Throwing long, like a train whistle, the football of my thoughts.I want to ride Spring's purity of power, its unbridled freedom.  In a nutshell,To take up the joy of a lifetime

II.Spring is EverywhereWhen Spring fell from the sky,The trees caught it first,Softening the blow with theirLush leafy sound.Then a delicate thumpThump Arose, as if a flat handWere patting the dark,Fleshy soil repeatedly.I'm guessing rabbitsHad braved from their burrowsTo play on the lawn.These are earth-born sounds,Hymns to nature'sIrrepressible vitality.  Yet SpringBoasts a more heavenlyMusic,

V.Images for Easter(1) A white stone rolls into The sea and becomes a seashell. A white wave enfolds it.(2) A green and gold bird fits neatly Into the palm of the hand, Perched like a newly minted coin. The wind lifts its song high And sets it down gently Into a nest of invisible sunlight.(3) Fern leaves droop, draped In thin black ribbons of rain. They drink as if from themselves; The rain revives

IV.Good FridayHis journey into the final end of it began in earnestWhen his voice first choked, spitting out a salty red brine.They had fed it to him like thick soup, ladling it upFrom deep inside his body.  In his stomach,His throat, his mouth, all the way up,It had burned like tears.  "Death will free me of it,"He'd hoped.  "Then this moment of dying will have becomeOne with my flesh." 

III.Our Lady of SorrowsI inch forward from the crowd, urged on by the gathering darkness;A few follow, pressing close behind as if tethered to me by a rope.A single, short cry floods the hills; soon it fades away, echoing onIn my mind's numbness, in the speechlessness of my heart.I am determined to show them, show all of them, these soldiers,That his head has slumped forward, his body hangs lifeless,His

II.A Contemplative in LentHow many times did I promise you everything,The wind shaking loose the sweet fruitOf sunrise or sunset, of snowfall in winterOr rain in spring?  How many times, andYou said nothing?  How often did I whisper,"It's me," waiting to receive an answer,And received none?  Yet I will try again this year.Yes, I will promise again to mold my soulInto a clod of soft black

I.To JerusalemI joined the little band of followers to fight the good fight,To stand face to face, toe to toe, with the Temple's faceless,Toeless tyranny.  For too many years the pleas of my peopleHad hurled themselves out over the wide land, only to beBaked and dried under the white sun like a mule's corpse.How often I braced myself to receive full-on the high tide ofThe news of the coming of

At Home~central IllinoisI've reentered the land of cornfields.No pioneer trail preceded me here, onlyA magic carpet of golden corn husksAnd the wind-swept linen of a clear blue sky.There is just one way for me to returnTo a life lived among shattered sidewalksWhere the city's tangled paths twist and turn,And that way is forever closed to me.I lounge, rather, in the shade of an oak treeHoarding the

Passing Through~Beale Street, Memphis, USAOh, what madness there is in the steely voiceOf an upright piano pounding levies like a swollen river.What pings of glee spring from the sleek body ofAn electric guitar and bounce off walls like popcorn.The dirge-like wailing of a tenor sax becomes a butterflyAnd flits away, sipping flowers up and down the whole lengthOf the street.  Yes, Beale Street,

I.Another Spring PoemIt cannot be otherwise than with these white-cappedDogwoods loitering here and thereAmid the thin lances of the pine trees aimedAt the sky.  The glass bottomBoat of the heavens floats slowly by overhead,While here below azaleas swirl like schools of fish.Yes, life teems, thick as a coral reef.A distant stretch of field lies strewnWith wriggly dandelions.  And here close

Pasqueflower in the rain II.Sunday Morning~MarylakeSnails, slugs, earthworms crowd the flowerbed's wet floor.Clouds, spun of glass, are set out like bowls filled with melon.A stray thought passes, maybe one about Mary as she stoopsTo kiss the cold lips of her son, or about the wreathThat enfolded the prayer she then whispered.Rich rye bread for breakfast and, later, icy lemonade,After a brisk walk. 

I.Nightfall~DallasSomehow, once I'd climbed out of the wellOf late afternoon,I found it there, set out on a plate,Still fresh after waiting all this timeFor me to arrive.  Yes, evening was offering itselfTo me like a blueberry muffin, with itsPurplish inner auraThat leaves a stain on the tongue.Never would I have asked anything more of youTo prove that you still, that you have always cared,O my

V.Intimations of SpringIt took a thousand years, but at last a new warmthWorked itself free.  Slicing through alleyways no biggerThan a man's fist, this first hint of spring soon picked up speed,Veering left and right like stampeding cattle,Bumping against doors and shutters and jostling wind chimes.The clatter sent pigeons soaring skyward like fireworks,The day's cloud cover parting before them. 

IV.On Being BaptizedIn time I learned how to write of the sea.  Or, better,Of the wave that carried me out to sea.  Its warmChurning sound called me to the window.  I looked outAnd, behold, there it was, the wave gathering in the distance.I watched it roll in, utterly spellbound by the sight.Should I call to it, I wondered?  But before I could speakIt raised a cry of its own. 

III.The Dead of WinterAnd there it was, this solid wall of cold disintegrating in an icy rain.My own bony body had already emptied itself out, soundingA few tinny chords that were unable to build a music for themselvesNo matter how hard they tried.  Now night was washing ashore,A field of black roses flooding the lawn just below my window. *What am I to make of it?  Day had raised a towerOf

II.Mary, Mother of GodHer child was born without arms or legs,But found his legs in the roots of trees,In their thickest roots that chisel through frozen soil;And he found his arms in the roll and wrestle of a brook,In the curve of a swan's neck, in the raysOf the late sun lodged like spears between hilltops.So she carried her child down the road;And from behind the dark weight of each doorway,Of each

I.The Turning of the YearWho is it that, this past spring, wrote haiku about pine trees, howIn them is found a life that grows suppler with age?  Or who, this summer,Spread wide his arms in song, pulling back the dark curtain of nightAnd letting the morning dew luxuriate like a vapor?Or who, this autumn, stepped out upon the soggy earthWhere its fertile powers shot upward into reds and yellows? 

III.The Fourth of the MagiAnd I took to the road on footWhere tree limbs bent low, clawing at me.Beasts lurked in the shadows, beasts I'd never seen before,And owls hooted even at noon.They say wild men haunt these placesClothed in prickly boar's hide.On their heads sit wreaths with leaves the size of a giant's hand.Some, it's rumored, grow tailsThat sprout an inch a yearFor each year of their madness. 

II.A Child is BornSurely you understood that, starting today, everything must begin anew.You, like us, born knowing next to nothing of the world,Must await the sun to introduce you to this thing called warmth.And you, like us, snatched from blindness, must now learnTo touch with feelers of recognition so many familiar faces.  LaterYou will have first to see the far horizon to hear the silver mountains

I.Winter SolsticeThe day of your arrival is built on an impending darkness,On a cold that stabs and stabs as it lifts its cry.  See the splinters of frostLying strewn on the lawns and sidewalks, tracing a prickly pathThat the wind follows, eyes sightless,Eye sockets hollow.  Townsfolk hurry by as the wind slides on ahead, outOver the lake, flat on its belly.There, as if from a dark mirror,

V.Christmas ShoppingLate fog crowds the streets.  A starlit journey lies before me,Trudging through that part of my life where words like YuletideStill apply, where treasure chests openGlimmering in the faces of shoppers as they elbow past.Soon lights, too, will flicker, to chase away every shadow of self-pity.Life is truly beautiful.  I've said that before, once againIt's crossed my lips. 

IV.At the Deathbed of St. John of the CrossAnd when you died, we felt your hands trembling in ours; or was it our handsTrembling in yours?  The night had won through to us and stoopedAt the door like some beast come home to its cave; we heard itPurring contentedly--the fireplace ablaze, logs aflame.Maybe it was just your last, strangely tender breathing we heardSpread through the room like sleeping

III.Our Lady of GuadalupeIs it true that you were here, that you once stood where stone sits coldlyOn stone?  That your feet drew the chill about them like slippers?You left leaving no footprints behind, except when, yearAfter year, we kneel to press our lips to the ground, our flesh to this clay,Our hunger to your agelessness.Is it true you neither smile nor frown, riveted as you areTo the uncertain

II.John the Baptist - Winter MeditationsIf You Lord had been here to hear my cryAnd give breath to my roaring,Your love wrapped in thick leather straps about my heart,Then I wouldn't now need You quite so much to call my soul backFrom its weariness.  Oh, silence to silence I advance towards blindness.My eyes are sunken, sunless, the eyes of winter. *Day has passed over into night.  Chill

I.The World a Chapel (1)We live amid song, and it’sUsually joyful.  The sun comes up,Birds cry out, we’re startled by it.Can it be that the world itselfAwakens us?  That it's been granted this powerOf its own, renewed each dayAs night passes like the shadow of GodAnd we return to ourselves?  We wake,We hear the windBrushing the windowpane, a tree limbIn its hand, like the batonOf

~written at Marylake MonasteryMercy is, or is not, Beauty.Mercy is, or is not, maybe, the factThat there is Beauty, the suddenOnslaught of it at work among us.Day starts up, andThe spirit that animates such thingsApportions, first, fire, then a gentler lyricismUpon this fog that lingers over the lake.Alongside it stirs the further consideration that it'sMid-October, which can be aNostalgic time of

~after a conference on St. ThereseWe knocked at the door.  Did she answer?A sprinkle of rain brightened the streets,The trees, the lawns, the sidewalks--The city shone, and her eyes everywhereLooked out as if from behind a window.Hardly daring a smile, she turned and hid.In time a rainbow appeared, traced backTo her open hands . . . She had tossedA white dove in the air and said:  Be free,Free

--written at Marylake MonasteryThe moon rises, as if the disk could fill the black cave,Its entrance, then the topography of the place, Flowing out along paths that cross the lake:“No more weepingThis evening,"It says, its beauty keeping.How simple the saint I possess like anOld boat, whose love spans the whole lake,How easily its voice treads the water:I echo off the shorelineAnd sit under

  It is important to remember that beauty is not an attribute that simply adheres to or belongs to a thing—be it a natural object or scene, or a person, or a work of art.  Beauty, rather, is a moment of revelation.  We grasp it, it grasps us.  It is born of an interplay between our interior awareness and this something or someone, which interplay ends up bestowing on us

        Last year for Holy Week I posted four poems intended to mark the spirit of the Paschal Mystery, of the Easter Triduum.  I wrote those poems some time ago—in fact, quite some time ago—although I'm not sure why that matters.  The following two poems I also wrote some time ago, and they, too, are intended for these special holy days of the Ester Triduum. 

        The following is from a poem by Jessica Powers, whom I referred to in my previous blog post.  The poem is entitled "Everything Rushes, Rushes."         . . . everything in creation rushes, rushes        toward God--all trees, small bushes,        quick birds and fish, the beetles round as naught, 

        First, I will quote a couple of lines from a poem by Jessica Powers (who in Carmel was known as Sr. Miriam of the Holy Spirit, OCD):        Music by right is for the solitaries         whom a long silence trains to the profound.        The lines are

I have joined their number, they who once said, “O winding staircase,That empties into the sky, you are my prayer this night.”The dark that peopled the streets and parks, the room grown still,It fills my eyes as sleep comes from afar, from across the sea.You were here with me, you always were, you never left.What did you whisper throughout the day, what secrets for survival? To see the sun set

For thus says the Lord,The creator of the heavens,    who is God,The designer and maker of the earth,    who established it;Not as an empty waste did he create it,    but designing it to be lived in:I am the Lord, and there I no other.        —Isa 45: 18        Jesus of Nazareth is God’s

ContemplationAwash with a shallow stream of light, the chapel bracesTo witness the Spirit come forth at this hour.He rides as though over stones polished smoothAnd shimmering with wakefulness,The sound that of a swift gallop under rain.  He does not stop.I offer him the setting sun of my sadness,Whose shadows lean in, trying to make themselves his own.If only he could find his way to me across

       There is a poem by Denise Levertov--an English poet who spent much of her life in the US, and who died in 1997 at the age of 74—which was written towards the end of her life, and which gives expression to a truth of the human spirit gained through a lifetime of poetic practice.  The poem is entitled “Sojourns in the Parallel Word," and in part it reads:   

    In my previous post on the poem The Dark Night I recounted the simple story of a lovers tryst, told by the woman, which the poem narrates.  But, in doing so, I omitted one key stanza, the central one, which lies at the heart of the poem, namely, stanza 5.  It reads:Night that guided me,Night lovelier than the dawn,O Night that unitesThe lover and beloved,Beloved made one

Nightfall    1.The moon is full, wedged in at the top of the hill.Its floodgates open, and the goldenLandscape of day recedesReceiving a river of innocence and awe.A silver age follows, An age of journeys into the night.Tall trees sway and wave us on, stirred by the wakeful dead.There is something miraculousIn the way we do not doubtThese moments are truthful and good.   

       How does one express in poetry the experience of divine love?  One can try to do so directly, by using direct statement, and writing explicitly religious verse.  St. John of the Cross adopts this approach, and accomplishes it masterfully, in his poem The Living Flame of Love.       But usually this approach—to capture by

At the Burial of Jesus You went and the hilltop shuddered, loosed of its burden.The air tastes of salt, here so very far from the sea.It is strange.  The waves are churning, the tide rolls in,The sun sets; very quietly and hastily we finish.Each goes off to his own house.  We do not say Good-bye.  Shall we meet again tomorrow?When we had sealed the tomb, when everyone living at that

At the CrossYour hands and arms are thrown wide, For you are trying to stand very still; there’s not much earthLeft to you, and what is burns like a torch.Smoke curls upward and disappears:We watch the day end.  Night droops like a tent; we tie down the flap.Now we must let our talk expand, let our dreams roam wide,Then return, stepping forth into the light.  We seeThe thought of them called

Good Friday    1.The sun sets slowly, an eyeball of wrath, unblinking; Dogs begin to bark.  In a far corner of the worldA watchman ceremoniously lowers a flag and folds itFor the night.  He has done this before;He will do it this last time.  Then the long farewell Will have ended.  He who once was among us will have gone.    2.The wind picks up and

Previously, I submitted two poems posted on our provincial blog, the Discalced Carmelite Friars - Province of St. Therese.  As part of the re-organization of our blogs, those two poems are being moved to this blog, Poet and Contemplative, as part of a Poetry series. Here is the second poem.  A short interpretive note follows.  Into AfternoonWe knew all along about the shadows, howThey

My intention is, from time to time, to submit poems I’ve written and have them posted on this blog, Poet and Contemplative. Previously, I submitted two poems to the Discalced Carmelite Friars - Province of St. Therese Blog. In re-organizing the blogs of our province, those two poems are now being moved to this one. Here is the first. For those of you who enjoy poetry, I hope they will speak to

        I've been speaking in the opening three posts of this blog—which I've called, "Setting the Table"—about the act of creation, both divine and human.  But I’ve been doing so in much too abstract a way.  It's time to get specific and look at a particular instance of, in this case, poetic creation—a well-known instance, the poem "The Dark Night"

        St. John of the Cross has little to say about poetry itself or the process of its composition.  What he does have to say is almost exclusively to be found in the prologue to his commentary on The Spiritual Canticle, where he discusses, briefly, the sources of his inspiration and the manner of his poetic expression.  For example, in the first paragraph

        The following lines are from a poem by Kathleen Raine, a British poet and scholar who died in 2003:    And must I then take pity on    The raging of the storm    That rose up from the great abyss    Before the earth was made,    That pours the stars in cataracts    And

        How a poem gets written varies from poet to poet, even from poem to poem.  Yet across the board there must be something mysterious about the process.  Why does the poet decide on just this particular word rather than another, although both appear, at least at first, to work equally well?  Why does the poet choose this image or metaphor or particular