A response to Stephen Evan's post, The Jesus of Silver Spring



English has two great forgotten words, namely 'helpmeet' which is much greater than 'lover' and 'loving-kindness' which is so much greater than even 'passion'.  Lawrence Durrell

I thought how unpleasant it is to be locked out; and I thought how it is worse, perhaps, to be locked in. Virginia Woolf. (Without hesitation, I would remove the 'perhaps'.)

A good poem helps to change the shape of the universe, helps to extend everyone's knowledge of himself and the world around him. Dylan Thomas (What he says of the powers of poetry, I would extend to all authentic writing and every random act of kindness.)

Who do you say that I am? Jesus Christ to St Peter.

Perhaps the last quote seems a strange inclusion in the light of Stephen's post. For me, it does sum up his musings.

Any response to the question is generally unvoiced, shadowy, hardly or never considered, but is implicit and inescapable in our attitude to being. In this mirror, we see our reflection. Through our own lens, we measure others, forever searching for an image we recognise, though we're scarcely aware of it. Meanwhile the quest for joy, for a life of fulfilment and meaning goes on.

Jesus says: I am come that they might have Life, and that they might have it more abundantly.

Abundant life! A blossoming tenderness for the whole of Creation and a compulsion to care for it.

Then all may become as it should be, by miraculous consolation, even in the dark times. Keats' 'negatitive capability' is a cosmic phenomenon and a scandal equally to logicians and doomsayers as to those who seek shelter in a shiny fools' paradise.

This is the most precious gift. This is Living. This is Love. Enjoy!

Hearts do matter!

Heartsease courtesy of Matthew Drollinger

Oh, do not give me sunrise

and day beguiled

with ripening smiles, delivered safe

dawning of dismissal

from a brighter sphere

shrunk to oblivion

in the womb of night

the sea's bloodbath gilded with promise

And do not give me sunrise

on teasing cusp

of an epiphany that cannot wax

amidst a galaxy

of solipsist worlds

whose ebbing heartbeats

crave unpolluted air

and epic rest and consummation

Oh, do not give me sunrise

apprehensions

of things that might and mustn't come to grief

tales of fair Avalon

unreached, and longings

withered to a fault

for want of nurture

in furrowed field at season's sowing

Pray, do not give me sunrise

with ravelled skeins

of untold histories and mysteries

designs untapestried

to be single-stitched

by fumbling fingers

in taut laboured hours

eyeless in Gaza and as a slave

But rather grant me sundown's laurels

blood fire-consumed!

an Indian Summer of the senses

spent flesh telling, spirit

hailing the far shore

shuffling loose the coil

while mystic music

in surround sound shuns costly cadence