here’s to opening and upward, to leaf and to sap
and to your(in my arms flowering so new)
self whose eyes smell of the sound of rain
and here’s to silent certainly mountains;and to
a disappearing poet of always, snow
and to morning; and to morning’s beautiful
music
Posted on by James Woodward
ah, the hidden sweetness
we find when the belly is empty!
we are no more or less than
string instruments: if
the sound box is full of something,
no music: obviously.
so: if the brain and the belly
are burned clean with fasting,
every moment a new song
c
Befriending Death
Posted on by James Woodward
MOTHER MARY CLARE SLG (1906-1988)
LIVING THROUGH THE DYING
Any Christian whether living in the world or in the Religious Life, active or enclosed, is being called as was St Antony of old to go down into the most frightening places of world history. If we are really trying to
interconnectedness
Posted on by James Woodward
Indra's net
Buddhism uses a similar image to describe the interconnectedness of all phenomena. It is called Indra's Net. When Indra fashioned the world, he made it as a web, and at every knot in the web is tied a pearl. Everything that exists, or has ever existed, ev
Learning to forgive ……………..more
Posted on by James Woodward
To forgive,” writes Mary Gordon, “is to give up the exhilaration of ones own unassailable rightness”
And there is loss in that, only it is the loss of an illusion, and what is gained is unmistakably real: the chance to live again, free from the bitterness that draws th
what we need is here
Posted on by James Woodward
Geese appear high over us,
pass, and the sky closes. Abandon,
as in love or sleep, holds
them to their way, clear
in the ancient faith: what we need
is here. And we pray, not
for new earth or heaven, but to be
quiet in heart, and in eye,
clear. What we need is h
leaves
Posted on by James Woodward
The same leaves over and over again!
They fall from giving shade above
To make one texture of faded brown
And fit the earth like a leather glove.
Before the leaves can mount again
To fill the trees with another shade,
They must go down past things coming u
Growing Older?
Posted on by James Woodward
BEDE GRIFFITHS: THE MONK GROWS OLD
Father Bede Griffiths was a a Catholic monk who spent most of his life as a
"Christian Yogi" in India, where he expounded the unity of world religions:
"(Father Bede) said at the age of 85 he begged to differ with those who
think that l
if only
Posted on by James Woodward
if only
Not I, not I, but the wind that blows through me!
A fine wind is blowing the new direction of Time.
If only I let it bear me, carry me, if only it carry me!
If only I am sensitive, subtle, oh, delicate, a winged gift!
If only, most lovely of all, I yield my
ATTAINING HAPPINESS
Posted on by James Woodward
The Turkish folkhero Mullah Nasruddin was renowned for his paradoxical approach to wisdom as both paradox and folly.
A student sought out Mullah Nasruddin for years, hoping to find guidance from him. He finally found the Mullah in the marketplace sitting atop a pile of an
if there are any heavens
Posted on by James Woodward
if there are any heavens
if there are any heavens my mother will(all by herself)have
one. It will not be a pansy heaven nor
a fragile heaven of lilies-of-the-valley but
it will be a heaven of blackred roses
my father will be(deep like a rose
tall like a rose)
&nbs
a golden petal
Posted on by James Woodward
The dawn was apple-green,
The sky was green wine held up in the sun,
The moon was a golden petal between.
She opened her eyes, and green
They shone, clear like flowers undone
For the first time, now for the first time seen.
D. H. Lawrence, Green
HAVE WE LIVED THE WRONG LIFE?
Posted on by James Woodward
"We all dimly feel that our transient historical identity is the only
chance in all eternity to be alive as a somebody in a here and a now. We, therefore,
dread the possibility, of which we are most aware when deeply young or very old, that at
the end we may find that we have l
asleep and dreaming
Posted on by James Woodward
He knew he was asleep and was dreaming
Of a beautiful poem. It seemed to be singing
Itself in the night, and he woke
In a bed in a room in an old hotel
And lay there, hearing the song go on
Though he could see the shape
Of his empty shirt on the straight chair
And his empty sh
Celebrate Imperfection ?
Posted on by James Woodward
W H Auden told Golo Mann
that “in each of us, there is a bit of Catholic and a bit of
Protestant; for truth is catholic, but the search for it is protestant,”
Auden consistently saw the relation between the catholic truth and the protestant
search dialectically.
blue
Posted on by James Woodward
It is like the light coming through blue stained glass,
Yet not quite like it,
For the blueness is not transparent,
Only translucent.
Her soul's light shines through,
But her soul cannot be seen.
It is something elusive, whimsical, tender, wanton, childlike, wise
And n
Immortal Autumn
Posted on by James Woodward
I speak this poem now with grave and level voice
In praise of autumn, of the far-horn-winding fall.
I praise the flower-barren fields, the clouds, the tall
Unanswering branches where the wind makes sullen noise.
I praise the fall: it is the human sea
patience
Posted on by James Woodward
patience
An absolute
patience.
Trees stand
up to their knees in
fog. The fog
slowly flows
uphill.
White
cobwebs, the grass
leaning where deer
have looked for apples.
The woods
from brook to where
the top of the hill looks
over the fog, send up
no
sunflowers and our search for the divine?
Posted on by James Woodward
attain God...
he said, then realised
it had been done
with nothing
but sunflowers
from Nicolette Stasko, Conseil de Gauguin (advice from Gauguin)
Being Faithful ?
Posted on by James Woodward
Faithful living is mostly about spreading the good news through faithful relationships, built and nurtured over the long haul.
Congregations will continue to transform lives in new generations when they pay attention to what's important: hospitality, the nurture of