July 9: "Logos," Miracles, Bishop Baraga

Mary Oliver on miracles . . . 

Logos

by:  Mary Oliver

Why wonder about the loaves and the fishes?

If you say the right words, the wine expands.

If you say them with love

and the felt ferocity of that love

and the felt necessity of that love, 

the fish explode into many.

Imagine him, speaking,

and don't worry about what is reality, 

or what is plain, or what is mysterious.

If you were there, it was all those things.

If you can imagine, it is all those things.

Eat, drink, be happy.

Accept the miracle.

Accept, too, each spoken word

spoken with love.

I spend a good deal of time in the classroom talking about ethos, pathos, and logos with my writing students.  Ethos is a rhetorical appeal that relies on the credibility and trustworthiness of the writer.  Pathos is an appeal to the emotions--basically getting your readers emotionally invested in your message (through compassion or anger or pity, for example).  Logos is the exact opposite of pathos.  Logos is an appeal to reason and logic and intellect.

Mary Oliver isn't really trying to engage in a rational debate in this poem.  She's talking about the Biblical narrative of the loaves and fishes, where Jesus feeds five thousand people with five loaves of bread and two fish.  If you are casting around for an explanation of this miracle, you're missing the point of Oliver's poem and the gospel accounts.  The disciples accepted the miracle without question.  Oliver pretty much backs up the disciples.  She tells her readers to just "Accept the miracle."

I know that's difficult for a lot of people.  Back in Biblical times, it was taken for granted that angels walked the Earth and blindness could be cured with mud and a little spit.  Logos didn't even enter the equation.  It was mostly pathos and ethos.  Nowadays, pathos and ethos are left to poets and artists and musicians.  Logos is the realm of scientists and engineers.  Miracles belong to people who dance with rattlesnakes, blind with desperation.

When my sister, Sally, was diagnosed with terminal lymphoma of the brain, I prayed for a miracle.  I worked in healthcare for close to 20 years, so I knew all about prognoses and diagnoses.  When I first saw images from Sally's CAT and PET scans, the logos side of my brain knew immediately that my sister had little chance of surviving.  But ethos and pathos wouldn't let me completely abandon hope for recovery.

My family contacted the local Catholic diocese, and a few days later, our parish priest arrived at my parents' house where Sally was under hospice care.  Father Larry brought a relic from Bishop Baraga, a Slovenian Roman Catholic missionary who was the first Bishop of Marquette from 1857 to 1868.  Baraga's cause for sainthood is currently under consideration by the Vatican.

Father Larry brought one of Bishop Baraga's stoles and anointed my sister with it.  Then, we recited a family rosary.  It was a powerful moment, with hope hovering in the room like a trapped sparrow, beating at the windows of all our hearts.  That night, everyone in my family believed in miracles.

About a week or so later (maybe less), Sally took a last, deep breath one morning and died, surrounded by her family and closest friends, and it was a miracle.  Not the miracle we where looking for, but a miracle nonetheless.  Each person in the room lifting Sally up, sending her on her final journey with gratitude and grief for the time we all had with her.

No, my sister didn't miraculously jump out of bed to whip up a pot of her spaghetti sauce.  No, she didn't miraculously open her eyes and tell us to stop being babies.  And no, the room didn't miraculously smell like blooming roses when she passed.

If you are a logos person, you probably won't experience anything miraculous in your lifetime.  Because you're too focused on comprehending and explaining, instead of just following Oliver's simple directive:  "Accept . . . each spoken word / spoken with love."

Saint Marty gives thanks tonight for each spoken word.  Each soft breath.  Each person he loves and who loves him.

May 15: First Communion, Eloise, Classic Saint Marty

My son is the one with the Mohawk

It was a good ending to a stressful weekend.  In case you are interested, my bathroom is open for business after several hundred dollars.  No collapsed sewer lines.  No invasive tree roots.  No backhoes digging up my front yard.  When I flushed my toilet this morning, I did not hear gurgling in the bathtub drain.  Answered prayer.

Today was eventful.  My son made his First Communion this afternoon.  He did really well.  Remembered where to stand, when to bow.  He was able to stand still, keep his hands to himself.  Didn't drop the Communion wafer or spit out his mouthful of wine.  He even made it through Father Larry's sermon without throwing himself on the floor and saying, "How much longer?"  More answered prayer.

And tonight, we are celebrating my sister's birthday.  She is 51 years old today.  When my sister was born, the doctor told my mother to put her in a sanatorium and forget about her.  Up until 1984, there was a large asylum/mental hospital named Eloise operating outside of Detroit.  At the time my sister was born, it wasn't uncommon for people to simply drop family members who suffered from mental illness off at this facility (which was more like a self-contained city) and never return for them.  That could have been my sister, had my parents followed the doctor's advice.  They didn't.  My sister is a functioning and happy person.  Answered prayer.

I am surrounded by blessings.  In a little while, I will be starting a new job.  Two years ago, I was starting a new job, too, under much different circumstances.  My brother had just died, and my sister was on the verge of starting her slow decline.  I am in a much happier place right now.

May 15, 2014:  New Job and New Snow

Well, I have completed the first day of my new job.  The people are friendly and supportive.  My closest coworkers are helpful and understanding.  They laugh at my jokes.  I have established a chocolate drawer already, and I acquired a new badge from Human Resources.  One that reflects my new position and department.  Overall, it wasn't horrible, although I truly miss the work and people at my old job.

It is snowing currently.  Sitting in my office at the university, I am watching thick, fat snowflakes falling.  They're starting to accumulate on the grass.  It would be a lovely scene if it weren't the middle of May.  New snow at this time of year is about as welcome as a case of explosive diarrhea.  Lake Superior is still frozen over, and, two weeks ago, I still had snow drifts in my backyard.  Winter is never going to end.

Saint Marty is ready to start singing "Let It Go."

I'm tired of letting things go...

August 13: Michael David Madonick, "Iris," King Kong, Terrible Darkness, Adventures of Stickman

Iris

by:  Michael David Madonick

About the lip
there is an edge.  More
to the point, an edginess,
not so nervous as to be
construed as shy, but an
inclination, nevertheless,
toward the ascetic.  The clam
belly's undulant scallop, or
Jessica Lange that instant before
Kong came raging
through the wood.  Tied up
in beauty and in rope, it never
wants to give what it seems
to show.  And he, however
soft his hairy hand, is bound
by her music, to fall
asleep, then
dead.

Yes, I'm changing things up a little bit.  I wanted to start with Mike Madonick's poem, simply because it sort of captures the kind of day I've had.  The poem is about being on the edge.  The trees of the jungle trembling, hiding the giant ape about to burst through.  The lip of the flower hiding something pink and beautiful.  Or deadly.

Tonight, I went to the funeral home to make some preliminary arrangements for my sister's funeral.  It wasn't half as difficult as I anticipated.  The two sisters who accompanied me actually stuck to the plan we decided upon last night.  There wasn't bickering, raised voices, or name calling.  It took about 45 minutes.

Back at my parents' house, our parish priest came.  Father Larry brought a stole used by Frederic Baraga, first bishop of Marquette, who died in 1868.  Bishop Baraga is on the road to sainthood.  Currently, he has been given the title "Venerable," which is the first step toward canonization.

Father Larry wrapped Bishop Baraga's stole around my sister's head and chest.  We prayed over her.  Every person in the room (12 in all) laid hands on her.  Then Father Larry anointed her with chrism.  Finally, we recited a rosary. When I looked over at my dad, he was weeping.  It broke my heart to see him.

It was strange to go from planning my sister's funeral to praying for her recovery.  Like in Mike Madonick's poem, I feel like something's approaching.  Something huge.  But I can't see it in the trees.  It might be a miracle--my sister sitting up in her bed and saying that she's hungry.  Or it might be death--a phone ringing in the middle of the night in a dark room.

Ives and Annie experience something similar the night that their son dies:

As they happily walked to the subway, they were looking forward to spending a lot of time together at home during the holiday, in the company of family and friends.  Ives and Annie had stopped to peer into a window display of French linen when, just like that, a terrible darkness entered them, and they could not move and stood looking at one another stupidly, on the crowded and busy sidewalk.

Ives and Annie have no idea what the darkness means.  One minute, they're doing a little Christmas window shopping.  The next, they're filled with inexplicable dread.  Something big is approaching, and the trees are shaking.

Saint Marty is praying for a miracle, but he's preparing for something darker.  Heavier. 
King Kong-sized.

Adventures of STICKMAN