Daughter

There is one grief worse than any other.

When your small feverish throat clogged, and quit,
I knelt beside the chair on the green rug
and shook you and shook you,
but the only sound was mine shouting you back,
the delicate curls at your temples,
the blue wool blanket,
your face blue,
your jaw clamped against remedy --

how could I put a knife to that white neck?
I bend instead over your dead weight
to administer a kiss so urgent, so ruthless,
pumping breath into your stilled body,
counting out the rhythm for how long until
the second birth, the second cry
oh Jesus that sudden noisy musical inhalation
that leaves me stunned
by your survival.

Ellen Bryant Voight, The Forces of Plenty (W. W. Norton & Company, 1983)

People Like Us

for James Wright

There are more like us. All over the world
There are confused people, who can't remember
The name of their dog when they wake up, and people
Who love God but can't remember where

He was when they went to sleep. It's
All right. The world cleanses itself this way.
A wrong number occurs to you in the middle
Of the night, you dial it, it rings just in time

To save the house. And the second-story man
Gets the wrong address, where the insomniac lives,
And he's lonely, and they talk, and the thief
Goes back to college. And in graduate school,

You can wander into the wrong classroom,
And hear great poems lovingly spoken
By the wrong professor. And you find your soul,
And greatness has a defender, and even in death
      you're safe.

Robert Bly, Eating the Honey of Words (HarperCollins Publishers, Inc., 1997)

When the Song of the Angels Is Stilled

When the song of the angels is stilled,
When the star in the sky is gone,
When the kings and princes are home,
When the shepherds are back with their flock,
The work of Christmas begins:

To find the lost,
To heal the broken,
To feed the hungry,
To release the prisoner,
To rebuild the nations,
To bring peace among brothers and sisters,
To make music in the heart.

Howard Thurman, The Mood of Christmas and Other Celebrations (Friends United Press, 1985)

I Worried

I worried a lot. Will the garden grow, will the rivers
flow in the right direction, will the earth turn
as it was taught, and if not how shall
I correct it?

Was I right, was I wrong, will I be forgiven,
can I do better?

Will I ever be able to sing, even the sparrows
can do it and I am, well,
hopeless.

Is my eyesight failing or am I just imaging it,
am I going to get rheumatism,
lockjaw, dementia?

Finally I saw that worrying had come to nothing.
And gave it up. And took my old body
and went out into the morning,
and sang.

Mary Oliver, Swan: Poems and Prose Poems (Beacon Press, 2010)

Gravy

No other word will do. For that's what it was. Gravy.

Gravy, these past ten years.

Alive, sober, loving and

being loved by a good woman. Eleven years

ago he was told that he had six months to live

at the rate he was going. And he was going

nowhere but down. So he changed his ways

somehow. He quit drinking! And the rest?

After that it was all gravy, every minute

of it, up to and including when he was told about,

well, some things that were breaking down and

building up inside his head. "Don't weep for me,"

he said to his friends. "I'm a lucky man.

I've had ten years longer than I or anyone

expected. Pure gravy. And don't forget it."

Raymond Carver, All of Us, (Knopf, 1998)

Stopping by Woods on A Snowy Evening

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village, though.
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

Robert Frost, The Poetry of Robert Frost,
ed. Edward Connery Lathem, (Jonathon Cape 1967)

The Peace of Wild Things

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear for what my life and my children's lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

Wendell Berry, The Selected Poems of Wendell Berry (1998)

Otherwise

I got out of bed
on two strong legs.
It might have been
otherwise. I ate
cereal, sweet
milk, ripe, flawless
peach. It might
have been otherwise.
I took the dog uphill
to the birch wood.
All morning I did
the work I love.

At noon I lay down
with my mate. It might
have been otherwise.
We ate dinner together
at a table with silver
candlesticks. It might
have been otherwise.
I slept in a bed
in a room with paintings
on the wall, and
planned another day
just like this day.
But one day, I know,
it will be otherwise.

Jane Kenyon, Otherwise, (1996)

Adult Advent Announcement

O Lord,
Let Advent begin again
In us,
Not merely in commercials;
For that first Christmas was not
Simply for children,
But for the
Wise and the strong.
It was
crowded around that candle,
with kings kneeling.
Speak to us
who seek an adult seat this year.
Help us to realize,
as we fill stockings,
Christmas is mainly
for the old folks --
Bent backs
And tired eyes
Need relief and light
A little more.
No wonder
It was grown-ups
Who were the first
To notice
Such a star.

David A. Redding, If I Could Pray Again (Word, 1965)

David A. Redding, If I Could Pray Again (1965)

Bedside Manners

How little the dying seem to need --
A drink perhaps, a little food,
A smile, a hand to hold, medication,
A change of clothes, an unspoken
Understanding about what's happening.
You think it would be more, much more,
Something more difficult for us
To help with in this great disruption,
But perhaps it's because as the huge shape
Rears up higher and darker each hour
They are anxious that we should see it too
And try to show us with a hand-squeeze.

We panic to do more for them,
And especially when it's your father,
And his eyes are far away, and your tears
Are all down your face and clothes,
And he doesn't see them now, but smiles
Perhaps, just perhaps, because you're there.
How little he needs. Just love. More love.

Christopher Wiseman, In John Updike's Room: Poems New and Selected,(2005)

Wild Geese

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let  the soft animal of your body
    love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clear blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting --
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

Mary Oliver, Dream Work (1986)

Introduction

Welcome! Thanks for visiting. May you find joy and comfort, challenge and hope, for your life here.

This blog is primarily an anthology of poetry which I have found useful on the spiritual journey. There will also be posts with suggestions for using the anthology to enrich your life and deepen your faith.

For Christians, reading poetry for this purpose should be a familiar exercise. After all, the Bible is a foundational text for us, and a significant portion of the Bible takes the form of poetry. The Psalms are a good example in the Hebrew bible. In the New Testament, we could look at the songs in Luke 1 and 2.

You may want to begin by reading a poem, or several poems, for personal enjoyment. The anthology is not an assignment for you or something to be dreaded. It is entirely appropriate to simply read and reflect on what the poem seems to be saying to you.