Category Archives: poetry and prose

Random Thoughts about Prayer and Such

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Prayer is not a request for God’s favors. True, it has been used to obtain the satisfaction of personal desires. It has even been adopted to reinforce prejudices, justify violence, and create barriers between people and between countries. But genuine prayer is based on recognizing the Origin of all that exists, and opening ourselves to it….In prayer we acknowledge God as the supreme source from which flows all strength, all goodness, all existence, acknowledging that we have our being, life itself from this supreme Power. one can then communicate with this Source, worship it, and ultimately place one’s very center in it. (Piero Ferrucci)

I have paraphrased the teachings of Jesus before as, “Come on guys and gals, just get over yourselves! Get out of the way and I’ll fill the vacuum.”

But, so often, as W. H. Auden noted, “And Truth met him and held out her hand and he clung in panic to his tall beliefs and shrank away like an ill-treated child.”

The Crucible of Marriage

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I have said frequently, “What you see is what you are.” Karl Jung explored the phenomena of projection, contending that we often err in blaming other people or outside forces for what is going on within our own hearts.

I’m going to share with you here a simple exercise to test this premise. It will work…if you are honest with yourself. Take someone who is very important to you, a significant other or spouse and someone who you have been involved with for a long time. Then make a list of their flaws and eccentricities which anger you, which really grind your gears. Write them down and look over them carefully. THERE IS A LIST OF ISSUES IN YOUR OWN HEART THAT YOU NEED TO ADDRESS!

We get involved with and/or marry our complement, that person which completes us. They embody all those things that we desire; but, once the relationship deepens, the dark side begins to arise and conflict ensues. In our modern world, this problem is easily solved as we can divorce and, as mother once put it, “drive our ducks to another market.” But, more than likely we will end up with someone else who embodies the same qualities.

Marriage is a crucible, a container in which spiritual issues can be addressed. They will never be all addressed and the attempt to address them all is a problem in itself. But open and honest communication will put some of them on the table and allow some of them to be addressed. If the couple are then dedicated to the relationship, they will have the wherewithal to go about the daily routine of “hearth and home”, making their life together work while the conflict is addressed piecemeal, from time to time, but not compulsively!. There will be a baseline respect which will characterize the conflict and neither party will succumb to the temptation to think, “I am right! He/she is wrong!” Neither party will resort to violence, emotional or physical.

Here is a poem by Wendell Berry about the conflicted nature of marriage, entitled “Marriage”

How hard it is for me, who live
in the excitement of women
and have the desire for them
in my mouth like salt. Yet
you have taken me and quieted me.
You have been such light to me
that other women have been
your shadows. You come near me
with the nearness of sleep.
And yet I am not quiet.
It is to be broken. It is to be
torn open. It is not to be
reached and come to rest in
ever. I turn against you,
I break from you, I turn to you.
We hurt, and are hurt,
and have each other for healing.
It is healing. It is never whole.

 

A Mean-Spirited Poem about Hell

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BUT MEN LOVED DARKNESS RATHER THAN LIGHT

The world’s light shines, shines as it will,

The world will love its darkness still.

I doubt though when the world’s in hell,

It will not love its darkness half as well.

Now I don’t know anything about Richard Crashaw but I hope he was merely having a bad day when he penned this short poem.  Perhaps his wife had burnt the toast that morning, or perhaps she was neglecting her “conjugal duties”, or perhaps his neuro-transmitters were merely screwing around with him.  But this is a nasty, mean-spirited poem.

Now the “concept” of hell exists in world culture and I don’t doubt that hell exists.  But I’m no longer sure about its precise nature or when and where it takes place.  I do feel strongly that those who are most obsessed about condemning others to hell, and emphatic about the point, are pretty much already there themselves.

And those ugly mean-spirited preachers who shriek and scream their sermons about hell’s torments, scaring their children into “getting saved” when they have no idea what they are doing,  simultaneously guilting the adults into “Christian” piety, have no idea just how close they are to hell’s torments.

I Want to be (Un)Famous!

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I think all of us want to be famous meaning we want to be admired and love more than we can possibly be.  We want to be the BMOC or BWOC.  And some of us get to be but most of us are confined to obscurity and left with the vicarious satisfaction that comes from glomming onto (identifying with) popular heroes—sports stars, movie stars, musicians, political figures…and in my case, literary greats.

But I think we can still take great satisfaction in being insignificant  For, life is inherently paradoxical, nothing is as it seems, and if we look carefully at what we are doing we can take great satisfaction in our meagre, “insignificant” station in life.  If we have the humility to realize that our prime responsibility is to merely show up and fulfill our responsibilities…mundane though they may be…then we are doing our part in keeping this dog-and-pony show afloat.  And that IS significant and we can take the same satisfaction that we could have if we were famous!  There IS glory and power in mere Be-ing.  And ultimately, there is found the only Glory and Power in the universe even for those who are the movers-and-shakers in our world.

T. S. Eliot advised us to “offer our deeds to oblivion.”  That was not nihilistic…he was a man of great Christian faith.  He was merely noting that we should live our life as productively and meaningfully as we can and then realize that the outcome is beyond us, and we must trust that our actions will be helping to the unfolding of God’s purpose.  Eliot, in the same marvelous poem, The Four Quartets, said that this faith requires merely, “prayer, observance, discipline, thought and action.”   Here is a marvelous poem by Naomi Shihab Nye about this type of “fame,” entitled, Famous:

 

The river is famous to the fish.

The loud voice is famous to silence,
which knew it would inherit the earth
before anybody said so.

The cat sleeping on the fence is famous to the birds
watching him from the birdhouse.

The tear is famous, briefly, to the cheek.

The idea you carry close to your bosom
is famous to your bosom.

The boot is famous to the earth,
more famous than the dress shoe,
which is famous only to floors.

The bent photograph is famous to the one who carries it
and not at all famous to the one who is pictured.

I want to be famous to shuffling men
who smile while crossing streets,
sticky children in grocery lines,
famous as the one who smiled back.

I want to be famous in the way a pulley is famous,
or a buttonhole, not because it did anything spectacular,
but because it never forgot what it could do.

“The Silver Lining Playbook” and Mental Illness

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Oh I just love mental illness! How could I not, having been a “mental health counselor”. You see, many eons ago, human culture realized that they had a bunch of people on their hands who “just didn’t get it” and started calling them…for lack of a better term…”nuts.” So, they rounded them all up, tossed a ton of money their way, and said, “Go amuse yourselves.” (One might say, “Go pleasure yourselves!”) So, the “village idiots” congregated on the hinterland and shortly thereafter divided up between the “mental health providers” and the “mentally ill.” I fortunately managed to gain admission to the former group though I’m sure that some of my family and friends would beg to differ with me!

But, seriously, I find mental illness fascinating on so many levels. I’d like to discourse on the subject with regard to a recent movie, “The Silver Lining Playbook” starring Jennifer Lawrence, Bradley Cooper, and Robert DeNiro. Cooper has the lead role of “the crazy guy” who has just been released from a mental hospital back to his family which proves to be rife with dysfunction itself. (Who would have thunk it!) He is sure it is going to be different this time and has convinced his family, his father being played by Deniro. But problems start immediately. “The crazy guy” notes at one point that he has trouble “filtering” what he says and this is apparent early on when, shortly after an awkward greeting by his father, he discloses that his mother had told him only moments earlier that his father was a bookie. His mother was stunned. Deniro was stunned and angrily asked his wife, “How could you tell him that?” Well, she could tell him that because she had forgotten something she should have known from this first 30 years of “the crazy guys life”–he does not have this “filter” which allows him to use good judgment in what he says and does. He discloses inappropriately routinely. He behaves inappropriately routinely. His judgment is glaringly deficient in most social situations. He does not know how to “filter” and participate in a social moment with regards to the subtle social arrangements that are in play. He merely says what is on his mind. That, in this story, is a vivid illustration of mental illness—the inability to exercise judgment, control internal impulses, and behave appropriately. One could even say it is the inability to be insincere as the social façade that is day to day life is just that—a social façade designed for more or less smooth functioning of the group. But when someone like “the crazy guy” can’t fit smoothly into this façade, the whole enterprise is jeopardized and he will be labeled “crazy” as he should be.

But, in this movie “crazy guy” has met “crazy gal” (Jennifer Lawrence). They negotiate their craziness and the minute they start to “negotiate” with each other….as in “negotiate” with another individual…they are less crazy. And they learn to love each other, to respect each other, and in so doing probably…I would assume…learn to love and respect the rest of the human race.

And I close with a lovely snippet from an Edgar Simmons poem:

Proofrock has been maligned.
Hamlet should have waived revenge,
Walked with Ophelia domestic corridors,
Absorbing the tic, the bothersome twitch.

Newtown, Ct, Faith, Hope, and Action

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The recent tragedy at Newtown, Ct. revealed the best and worst of our country. The worst is obvious—senseless violence, self-loathing turned outward. The best is seen in the ability of some of the parents to mobilize and in the midst of their agony voice a desire to take a lead in changing the laws re gun ownership. The event was so horrible that most of us can never really understand unless we have lived through something similar. It was horrible enough for us to hear and read about but to have actually had it happen to you is beyond my ability to comprehend. Part of me would be tempted to immediately surrender to bleak despair which always beckons just beyond the periphery of our conscious mind. In tragedies like this even our faith is sorely tested as that despair threatens that bedrock of our life, tempting us to go down the rabbit-hole of meaninglessness ourselves.

Maureen Down, the exquisite columnist for the New York Times, responded to this tragedy with a column entitled, “Why, God.” She then shared a response from a rabbi friend of hers, Father Kevin O’Neil,  to whom she posed the question. Here is his wisdom:

How does one celebrate Christmas with the fresh memory of 20 children and 7 adults ruthlessly murdered in Newtown; with the searing image from Webster of firemen rushing to save lives ensnared in a burning house by a maniac who wrote that his favorite activity was “killing people”? How can we celebrate the love of a God become flesh when God doesn’t seem to do the loving thing? If we believe, as we do, that God is all-powerful and all-knowing, why doesn’t He use this knowledge and power for good in the face of the evils that touch our lives?
The killings on the cusp of Christmas in quiet, little East Coast towns stirred a 30-year-old memory from my first months as a priest in parish ministry in Boston. I was awakened during the night and called to Brigham and Women’s Hospital because a girl of 3 had died. The family was from Peru. My Spanish was passable at best. When I arrived, the little girl’s mother was holding her lifeless body and family members encircled her.
They looked to me as I entered. Truth be told, it was the last place I wanted to be. To parents who had just lost their child, I didn’t have any words, in English or Spanish, that wouldn’t seem cheap, empty. But I stayed. I prayed. I sat with them until after sunrise, sometimes in silence, sometimes speaking, to let them know that they were not alone in their suffering and grief. The question in their hearts then, as it is in so many hearts these days, is “Why?”
The truest answer is: I don’t know. I have theological training to help me to offer some way to account for the unexplainable. But the questions linger. I remember visiting a dear friend hours before her death and reminding her that death is not the end, that we believe in the Resurrection. I asked her, “Are you there yet?” She replied, “I go back and forth.” There was nothing I wanted more than to bring out a bag of proof and say, “See? You can be absolutely confident now.” But there is no absolute bag of proof. I just stayed with her. A life of faith is often lived “back and forth” by believers and those who minister to them.
Implicit here is the question of how we look to God to act and to enter our lives. For whatever reason, certainly foreign to most of us, God has chosen to enter the world today through others, through us. We have stories of miraculous interventions, lightning-bolt moments, but far more often the God of unconditional love comes to us in human form, just as God did over 2,000 years ago.
I believe differently now than 30 years ago. First, I do not expect to have all the answers, nor do I believe that people are really looking for them. Second, I don’t look for the hand of God to stop evil. I don’t expect comfort to come from afar. I really do believe that God enters the world through us. And even though I still have the “Why?” questions, they are not so much “Why, God?” questions. We are human and mortal. We will suffer and die. But how we are with one another in that suffering and dying makes all the difference as to whether God’s presence is felt or not and whether we are comforted or not.
One true thing is this: Faith is lived in family and community, and God is experienced in family and community. We need one another to be God’s presence. When my younger brother, Brian, died suddenly at 44 years old, I was asking “Why?” and I experienced family and friends as unconditional love in the flesh. They couldn’t explain why he died. Even if they could, it wouldn’t have brought him back. Yet the many ways that people reached out to me let me know that I was not alone. They really were the presence of God to me. They held me up to preach at Brian’s funeral. They consoled me as I tried to comfort others. Suffering isolates us. Loving presence brings us back, makes us belong.
A contemporary theologian has described mercy as “entering into the chaos of another.” Christmas is really a celebration of the mercy of God who entered the chaos of our world in the person of Jesus, mercy incarnate. I have never found it easy to be with people who suffer, to enter into the chaos of others. Yet, every time I have done so, it has been a gift to me, better than the wrapped and ribboned packages. I am pulled out of myself to be love’s presence to someone else, even as they are love’s presence to me.
I will never satisfactorily answer the question “Why?” because no matter what response I give, it will always fall short. What I do know is that an unconditionally loving presence soothes broken hearts, binds up wounds, and renews us in life. This is a gift that we can all give, particularly to the suffering. When this gift is given, God’s love is present and Christmas happens daily.

In moments like this, it is easy to rely on religious and spiritual bromides. And I’m glad this formulaic wisdom is available as it too certainly has a place. We do the best we can. But this Rabbi’s response speaks to me as he acknowledges the uncertainty in life that religion cannot take away and should not in some instances. The uncertainty provides an opportunity for a mature faith that cannot be found with mere spiritual rhetoric and platitudes, regardless of how noble the intent. And this faith avows a hope…a Hope…and a courage to respond with meaningful action. When life disappoints, and certainly when life deals us a body-blow, can we find the Grace to right ourselves at some point in our grief and act with maturity, intelligence, and spiritual wisdom. How do we “give the name of action” to our emotions?

Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.

(Hamlet, William Shakespeare)

A Poem about the Ego

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I love you poets and creative writers. You so elegantly capture glimpses of reality which otherwise might go unnoticed by prosaic minds such as mine. This poem entitled “Ego” is a delightful approach to the subject.

 

EGO

(By Denise Duhamel)

 

I just didn’t get it—

even with the teacher holding an orange (the earth) in one hand

and a lemon (the moon) in the other,

her favorite student (the sun) standing behind her with a flashlight.

I just couldn’t grasp it—

this whole citrus universe, these bumpy planets revolving so slowly

no one could even see themselves moving.

I used to think if I could only concentrate hard enough

I could be the one person to feel what no one else could,

sense a small tug from the ground, a sky shift, the earth changing gears.

Even though I was only one mini-speck on a speck,

even though I was merely a pinprick in one goosebump on the orange,

I was sure then I was the most specially perceptive, perceptively sensitive.

I was sure then my mother was the only mother to snap,

“The world doesn’t revolve around you!”

The earth was fragile and mostly water,

just the way the orange was mostly water if you peeled it,

just the way I was mostly water if you peeled me.

Looking back on that third grade science demonstration,

I can understand why some people gave up on fame or religion or cures—

especially people who have an understanding

of the excruciating crawl of the world,

who have a well-developed sense of spatial reasoning

and the tininess that it is to be one of us.

But not me—even now I wouldn’t mind being god, the force

who spins the planets the way I spin a globe, a basketball, a yoyo.

I wouldn’t mind being that teacher who chooses the fruit,

or that favorite kid who gives the moon its glow.

 

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Here is more wisdom to share from my dear friend Emily. You know her as Emily Dickinson. Her poetry is so unusual, reflecting such an interesting and complicated mind which was so adept at addressing spiritual intricacies.

The following poem addresses the role of the ego in spiritual formulation as well as the need to let that ego go at some point. She described this “letting go” as “letting the scaffolding drop” at which point the soul is discovered. In another poem of hers she described this moment in these words, “And then a plank in reason broke…” Emily was addressing loss; or, in terms of object-relations theory, the “lost object.”

And of course, this experience does not destroy the ego, it merely humbles it and opens it up to another dimension of life. It gives the ego meaning. But often it does feel like destruction and in spiritual teachings indeed is presented as death.

 

THE PROPS ASSIST THE HOUSE

By Dickinson, Emily

 

The Props assist the House

Until the House is built

And then the Props withdraw

And adequate, erect,

The House support itself

And cease to recollect

The Augur and the Carpenter –

Just such a retrospect

Hath the perfected Life –

A Past of Plank and Nail

And slowness – then the scaffolds drop

Affirming it a Soul –

Spirituality and Paradox

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Spirituality is paradoxical. There is no other way to cut it. For example, I live when I die. I’m up when I’m down. I’m most when I’m least. I’m found when I’m lost.

Read how Kabir put it:

I won’t come

I won’t go

I won’t live

I won’t die

I’ll keep uttering

The name

And lose myself

In it

I’m bowl

And I’m platter

I’m man

And I’m woman

I’m grapefruit

And I’m sweet lime

I’m Hindu

And I’m Muslim

I’m fish

And I’m net

I’m fisherman

And I’m time

I’m nothing

Says Kabir

I’m not among the living

Or the dead

— Translated by Arvind Krishna Mehrotra

 

Simple Child-Like Faith

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This God business is really complicated. Or is it? I know that I tend to overly-complicate things at times with cerebration. Sometimes I wish I could merely accept the tribal version of the gods that came my way and then immerse myself in the customs and amusements of the culture.  (Goethe described people who do this as having,   “scanty wit, yet wholly at their ease, Like kittens given their own tail to tease.”)

And it is so easy to catch oneself trusting merely in his/her own “cerebrations” re God, captivated by our own cleverness, forgetting that according to Jesus it is only a child-like faith that brings us into the Kingdom of God. The cerebrations, perhaps even some “cleverness”, the intellectual pursuits, the “hunger and thirsting” after righteousness, all has its place. But ultimately spiritual matters are an issue of a simple, child-like faith. Belief in our belief will not suffice.

Here is a relevant poem by a 17th century English nobleman, Fulke Greville:

Chorus Sacerdotum

O wearisome condition of humanity!

Born under one law, to another bound;

Vainly begot and yet forbidden vanity;

Created sick, commanded to be sound.

What meaneth nature by these diverse laws?

Passion and reason, self-division cause.

Is it the mark or majesty of power

To make offenses that it may forgive?

Nature herself doth her own self deflower

To hate those errors she herself doth give.

For how should man think that he may not do,

If nature did not fail and punish, too?

Tyrant to others, to herself unjust,

Only commands things difficult and hard,

Forbids us all things which it knows is lust,

Makes easy pains, unpossible reward.

If nature did not take delight in blood,

She would have made more easy ways to good.

We that are bound by vows and by promotion,

With pomp of holy sacrifice and rites,

To teach belief in good and still devotion,

To preach of heaven’s wonders and delights;

Yet when each of us in his own heart looks

He finds the God there, far unlike his books.