Non-Annunciation (a Re-blog)

I am being very environmentally friendly with all the recycling of old stuff... For the various seasonal services I've been planning I've largely been using pieces by other poets, rather than writing anything new myself... I just have not had the creative energy. And even with these blogs, where I have been delving into my back-catalogue to reflect where I feel I am at the moment, I find that many of my words and ideas are second-hand. Last week I offered a piece inspired in large part by Janet Lees. Here in this one written in the dark days (and nights) of the 2020 pandemic lockdown, which speaks into how I've been feeling in recent days, I have shamelessly stolen from Christina Georgina Rossetti and St. John of the Cross.

Middle of the night, midwinter

As bleak as any I’ve known

With no snow on snow

To cover the decay underfoot.

Awake awaiting the dawn

Enfolded in the echoing dark

The cold silence pregnant

With potential, blessing, piercing.

But the archangel is absent

No heavenly harbinger

Of unusual good news

or peace in place of fear.

So I am left in the darkness

Uncomprehending, unhearing

God’s voice, unless

His language is silence.

Shalom

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Psalm for Harvest Sunday

A short responsive psalm for us as a call to worship on Harvest Thanksgiving Sunday, and given that it was pouring with rain as I headed into church this morning the first line is an important remembrance that the rain we moan about is an important component of the fruitfulness of the land we live in: You tend the land and water it And the earth produces its abundance. You crown each year with your bounty, and our storehouses overflow with your goodness. The mountain meadows are covered with flocks and the valleys are filled with corn; Your people celebrate your boundless grace They shout for joy and sing. from Psalm 65

Living under the Empire... (2) Where is Babylon?

We were driving back from school last week, talking about books that we had been reading and my younger son, Ciaran, asked me "Where is Babylon?" I have to confess that my history is better than my geography, and I said that it no longer exists as an inhabited city, but its ruins were to the north west of the current capital of Iraq, Baghdad. When I checked however, I discovered that it is actually about 50 miles south of Baghdad and the modern town is the administrative centre of the province of Babil... But just as the modern city is but a shadow of the historic capital of 2 ancient empires, first under Hammurabi in the 18th century BCE and then the "Neo-Babylonian" empire (under Nebuchadnezzar etc) in the 6th century BCE, so the earthly Babylonian empire/s was/were fleeting in comparison to the enduring metaphorical idea of Babylon. The original Empire under Hammurabi was probably the ultimate origin of some of the early Biblical stories, including the ...

A Woman of no Distinction

Don't often post other people's stuff here... But I found this so powerful that I thought I should. It's a performance poem based on John 4: 4-30, and I have attached the original YouTube video below. A word for women, and men, everywhere... "to be known is to be loved, and to be loved is to be known." I am a woman of no distinction of little importance. I am a women of no reputation save that which is bad. You whisper as I pass by and cast judgmental glances, Though you don’t really take the time to look at me, Or even get to know me. For to be known is to be loved, And to be loved is to be known. Otherwise what’s the point in doing either one of them in the first place? I WANT TO BE KNOWN. I want someone to look at my face And not just see two eyes, a nose, a mouth and two ears; But to see all that I am, and could be all my hopes, loves and fears. But that’s too much to hope for, to wish for, or pray for So I don’t, not anymore. Now I keep to myself And by that ...

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