poems for Christmas: mary's song
My book on Advent and Christmas (Order from Amazon, or from the publisher) includes a good bit of poetry; one of the poems that inspired me concerning Mary's story is this lovely poem by Luci Shaw:
Blue homespun and the bend of my breast
keep warm this small hot naked star
fallen to my arms. (Rest …
you who have had so far to come.)
Now nearness satisfies
the body of God sweetly. Quiet he lies
whose vigor hurled a universe. He sleeps
whose eyelids have not closed before.
His breath (so slight it seems
no breath at all) once ruffled the dark deeps
to sprout a world. Charmed by doves' voices,
the whisper of straw, he dreams,
hearing no music from his other spheres.
Breath, mouth, ears, eyes
he is curtailed who overflowed all skies,
all years. Older than eternity, now he
is new. Now native to earth as I am, nailed
to my poor planet, caught
that I might be free, blind in my womb
to know my darkness ended,
brought to this birth for me to be new-born,
and for him to see me mended
I must see him torn.
Luci Shaw
Maggi,
here is another poem for your advent-christmas offering. Brother Antoninus (William Everson)
was a figure in the San Franciso 'beat generation' of the fifties and sixties.
FYI, I am a retired Episcopal Priest ordained
46 years ago. I do supply in tiny churches and have about six folks in spiritual direction. If you want to put the poem straight into your blog with or without hattip, that would be fine.
Out of the Ash
Solstice of the dark, the absolute
Zero of the year. Praise God
Who comes for us again, our lives
Pulled to their fisted knot,
Cinched tight with cold, drawn
To the heart’s constriction; our faces
Seamed like clinkers in the grate,
Hands like tongs—Praise God
That Christ, phoenix imortal,
Springs up again from solstice ash,
Drives his equatorial ray
Into our cloud, emblazons
Our stiff brow, fries
Our chill tears. Come Christ,
Most gentle and throat-pulsing Bird!
O come, sweet Child! Be gladness
In our church. Waken with anthems
Our bare rafters! O phoenix
Forever! Virgin-wombed
and burning in the dark,
Be born! Be Born!
William Everson (Brother Antoninus, O.P.)
Posted by: J A Frazer Crocker | 10/12/2006 at 20:47
I read Mary's Song to the congregation of our small village church on Christmas morning. The response was every bit as enthusiastic as my own the first time I encountered it. Everyone wanted to know who had written it. It is one of the most beautiful and moving pieces of verse I have ever come across, it, seeps into your soul. My best present this Christmas.
Posted by: Henry Phillips | 27/12/2006 at 15:11