March 29: A Good Friday Poem, Madeleine L'Engle, "Mary Speaks:"

I have a poem for my disciples tonight from the writer Madeleine L'Engle.  It's from her collection A Cry Like a Bell which I reviewed several weeks ago in a post.  I find this poem particularly moving because it focuses on Mary and her part in the Jesus narrative.

I'm currently in between Good Friday services.  In a few hours I'll be heading off to the Episcopal church.  I'm looking forward to this one a little more.  The way the Passion is read during tonight's worship is particularly effecting.

Saint Marty is a sucker for a crucifixion story.

Mary Speaks:

O you who bear the pain of the whole earth,
     I bore you.
O you whose tears give human tears their worth,
     I laughed with you.
You, who, when your hem is touched, give power,
     I nourished you.
Who turn the day to night in this dark hour,
     light comes from you.
O you who hold the world in your embrace,
     I carried you.
Whose arms encircled the world with your grace,
     I once held you.
O you who laughed and ate and walked the shore,
     I played with you.
And I, who with all others, you died for,
     now I hold you.

May I be faithful to this final test:
in this last time I hold my child, my son,
his body close enfolded to my breast,
the holder held:  the bearer borne.
Mourning to joy:  darkness to morn.
Open, my arms:  your work is done.,

November 30: Bad News, "A Cry Like a Bell," A Poem

A good poem on a bad day

The reason I'm in a bad mood today/tonight/the rest of the weekend/possibly until New Year's Day:  my wife got fired from her job today.  She's taking it much better than I am at the moment.  I've been angry all afternoon long.  Right now, I'm in bed, in my pajamas, typing this post and trying to avoid interaction  with any person.  In the mood I'm in, it's best if I just pretend that I've suddenly developed a case of acute onset muteness.

I have been posting poems on Friday evenings for the past few weeks.  Despite my foul mood, I will not disappoint any of my disciples who have tuned in for a poetry fix.  This poem is by Madeleine L'Engle (yes, she of A Wrinkle in Time fame) and comes from her collection of verse titled A Cry Like a Bell.  It's a Christmas poem, because I'm trying to rekindle my yuletide spirit.  While I don't think L'Engle is a great poet, she has her moments.  The poem below is one of those moments.

Saint Marty is going to have some liquor spiked with eggnog now.

The Bethlehem explosion

And it came to pass in those days that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed.  And Joseph also went up from Galilee . . . to be taxed, with Mary his espoused wife, being great with child.  Luke 2:1, 4-5

The chemistry lab at school
was in an old greenhouse
surrounded by ancient live oaks
garnished with Spanish moss.

The experiment I remember best
was pouring a quart of clear fluid
into a glass jar, and dropping into it,
grain by grain, salt-sized crystals,
until they layered
like white sand on the floor of the jar.

One more grain--and suddenly--
water and crystal burst
into a living, moving pattern,
a silent, quietly violent explosion.
The teacher told us that only when
we supersaturated the solution,
would come the precipitation.

The little town
was like the glass jar in our lab.
One by one they came, grain by grain,
all those of the house of David,
like grains of sand to be counted.

The inn was full.  When Jospeh knocked,
his wife was already in labour; there was no room
even for compassion.  Until the barn was offered.
That was the precipitating factor.  A child was born,
and the pattern changed forever, the cosmos
shaken with that silent explosion.