Lost and Found

It was marvellous to be a newborn member of the Shepherd’s flock. The pastures were so lush and green that, even though many sheep were sharing the same meadow, it took no effort at all to find the softest, juiciest grass to eat. And, when she had eaten her fill, there was plentiful water to drink: water so still and clear that even a young lamb felt safe bending her head to drink from it. She ran and leapt and giggled with the other young lambs, but, just before the point where her tiredness would begin to make her disagreeable, the Shepherd would be right there (how did He keep watch on each one of them individually?) and He would make her lie down and rest. It was the most beautiful place, the happiest life, and she would gaze at the Shepherd in grateful adoration for the life He had given her.

Imagine her shock when, one day, the Shepherd said that it was time for the flock to move on. Looking around she realised that the grass was all cropped and the waters were growing muddy. She accepted, reluctantly, that she must follow the Shepherd away from this tranquil place.

But the route he took were like nothing she had expected. There were no rich pastures here. That was all gone. Oh there was enough, she didn’t starve, but there was never the more-than-enough which she craved. The paths were long and narrow, and it was hard to stay obedient to the Shepherd – to stop when the Shepherd said to stop, to keep going when the Shepherd said to keep going, to not wander off and munch on those tempting green plants which the Shepherd said would only do her harm. She wasn’t always obedient, but the Shepherd was always there to protect her when she most needed saving from herself. And in the journey she grew stronger, and learned to trust Him more, though she still longed for the rich pastures which had gone.

She needed that strength. For now the Shepherd led them through a terrible place, and she trembled for her very life. The drops were sheer, the paths were narrow, and there was a great darkness hovering over every hesitant step she took. Some sheep whispered that it was called the Valley of the Shadow of Death. It took all the obedience she had learned to keep going. But whenever the danger was greatest, somehow the Shepherd was always there to rescue her, and to shield her from destruction.

Eventually the nightmare was over. Many times she longed for the green pastures, but there was no going back. Now they had reached a flat and level place, and the Shepherd told them to stop. Yes there was rich grass here, but there were other plants growing among them which would kill the sheep. He must root these out before they could safely eat. And the sheep, impatient with hunger, huddled close together as they heard the howling of wolves in the background. They knew that their Shepherd was a match for any wolf, but it is a frightening thing to be in the presence of your enemies.

Eventually they ate richly, while their Shepherd stood guard. He walked among and checked them for the scrapes and sores from their difficult journey, pouring healing oil upon their wounds. She looked up at him with love. No, the journey wasn’t over yet, and difficulties and dangers probably lay ahead, but she no longer had regrets. She understood enough by now to know that the Shepherd was leading her through these things because He was taking her somewhere better, to a pasture that would never fade or fail, where she could drink forever from the water of life.

The Caged Eagle

(I began this in Singapore, seeing the birds of prey confined in cages which, though large, are still so much smaller than the wide skies they were created for. Found the poem in my notebook, and finished it this morning)

And is this all there is,

This which I see,

Or should there be

A different life for me?

Infinite skies I see

Beyond this cage

Incite in me strange longings

And strange rage.

Some glory calling,

Glory past my ken.

Stirring in me to rise there

Now and then.

I hear the wild wind

To my heart it sings.

I long to feel its power

In my wings.

All of this safety

Serves but to confine

This unstretched self

From serving the Divine.

I am no twittering sparrow

To content

My being with such

Circumscribed extent.

And should I choose to be

The smaller thing,

And never, never hear

The wild clouds sing?

It is temptation but

It is not life

To shun the dizzy height,

The wild winds’ strife.

Though curtailed and contained,

I choose to be

True to my blood and calling

And heart-free.

Sunlight dancing on the water

A thousand ballerinas

In glittering pirouette?

Or perhaps angels,

Grown since their mediaeval pinhead days,

Dancing to the glory?

Or minuscule ships of fire,

Burning but not consumed,

Skipping waves we cannot see?

Diamonds are too ordinary for this,

Too tainted by our groping avarice.

Coruscation:

Creation showing forth delight

Unbound from the wheel of time,

(The endless entropy of our heart-passion);

Instead

Anticipating

The merriment, the grace of joy reborn,

Delight that lights the Lamb’s great Wedding Feast

Polar Bears

(on predictions that they will become a threatened species)

If the reports (with all their oughts)

Are true,

If a wildness is vanished from the white,

And another wonder swallowed up

By our determined banality,

The greyness of the comfortable life,

Is the world bereft,

Another step in its long, slow grieving?

Do we conquer monsters with despair?

Is there room for play in the frozen wastelands?

Is there joy in the stark, dark night?

Do the Northern Lights sing mystery

For eyes that are not mine?

Loss and sorrow, the world’s long miserere,

The funeral march for springtime’s hopes and dreams.

Only the listening ear can hear,

Pianissimo,

The single flute motif of all things new.

The Day of Reckoning

Did they think he was a fool? Did they think their silly magic tricks would let him relinquish such a valuable asset? Say what they would about going three days into the desert to worship their God, they weren’t fooling him. Out of sight, and they would vanish faster than the morning dew in the desert air! He was Pharaoh, not some peasant to be taken in by a good story, and they were a race of slaves, born to serve. Without their labour, all his building projects would never get done. Why would he give away such a valuable asset? They might as well ask him to give away the River Nile, or the sun in the burning sky! But the River Nile knew its place and flowed between its banks, overflowing them once a year at just the right time so that the land of Egypt stayed fertile and prosperous. Certainly it had turned to blood that time, but that was just a magic trick, and, after all, it didn’t last. A bit unpleasant at the time, sure (ok, it was downright nasty) but no harm done in the long run. The Nile knew its place, and the blazing sun, Amun-Ra, knew his rightful place and stayed there, god though he was. Only this Moses, his brain obviously addled by too many years under the desert sun, kept coming back with this insane demand, “Let my people go!”

Yes, he had to admit it had been a bad year: locusts, hail, cattle plague, even that period of darkness which had terrified some of the priests and magicians and set them imagining all sorts of dreadful portents. Bad years happen. Hadn’t there been that time, way, way back in the mists of history, when they had famine for seven years? Terrible, yet Egypt had survived. He was Pharaoh, secure in his palace where no hurt could reach him. If a few peasants died, starved, suffered, well, that was the lot of peasants everywhere. He was tired of these Hebrews trying to gain credit for their futile cause from every misfortune that happened. If their God (who didn’t even seem to have a name or an image) were really so powerful, why would they be a race of slaves?

And now the latest news was that they had all been killing lambs from their flocks and painting blood on their doorways. What kind of slavish superstition was that? And so unhygienic! Actually, he’d better make a note to get the overseers to make them clean up before some sort of plague broke out among them. It would serve them right, of course, but he needed able-bodied slaves right now. Odd, wasn’t it, that none of those plaguey misfortunes that had racked Egypt lately seemed to have affected them?

It really was time he went to bed and stopped letting those slaves keep him from his rest. They really weren’t worth it! It must be nearly midnight. It was a mild night, he wandered out to the balcony, still unable to get them out of his head. And then, it was if a loud cry went out all over Egypt, as if some terrible calamity had happened in every home at once. And then, before he had time to begin to understand, a terrible keening cry rose up from within the palace, from the quarters of his eldest son, his beloved heir. What could possibly have happened?

The Ministry of Poetry

We carry tears for those who cannot cry,

We walk the darkness where they dare not die,

And say aloud their secret question “why?”

We kneel before the beauty that transcends

Encouraging the faltering knee that bends,

Offering word-wings so the heart ascends.

We dare to look towards the heart of things

Reminding that here, too, the Spirit sings,

And faith gives feet to all our journeyings.

We keep the secret vigils of the heart,

And then, with fumbling words, try to impart

Our wordless wonder with our struggling art.

Our songs are prayers for those who cannot pray

We bring small candles where there is no day

Offering our feeble lights to show the way.

When all the tears are cried, the words are said,

And memory and meaning seem all fled,

We’ll sing the resurrection of the dead.

Song of Confession

Oh God of the shining face

Mystery of mysteries, whose love out-sings the cherubim,

Mercy of eternity

Bend your grace on me.

I have walked (as all men walk)

With stumbling steps

Tripping over myself

In the rush towards my folly

Bending my tears to your ears

Unheeding of your love song.

I have climbed the precipice of pride

And thought myself lifted,

Swum the ardent puddles of my self-deceit,

And imagined me a conqueror of oceans,

Closed my eyes and turned my head

To avoid the relentless demands

Of unbearable pity,

And blamed you for my pain.

I have failed to love you

You, you whose love first spun me into being

Who can balance the galaxies on a fingertip,

And wipe my smallest tear.

I have turned away

From the gratitude of stars

And the secret of forgiveness

Into a self-bound world,

Self on self bent backwards,

And the angels sang and I drowned it with cheap jokes.

I have kept my neighbour

At the safe and careful distance that propriety demands,

Leaving no blood on the carpets,

From the bloodless banal words

That displace our hearts.

And my name is Pharisee,

And my cheap gilt mirrors

Show a strangely leprous face

(It must be the light.)

God of the shining face,

Light which is life

Turn not your face

Lest I perish,

Utterly undone.

One life,

One death,

One Way,

And I give thanks.