Words

When I have lost the words
that tell me who I am,
then visit me in silence, Lord,
and write for me my name.

And when I cannot speak 
to call you in my fear,
look down and see me in my need;
without a sound, draw near.

For you know all my thoughts
before I have the words
as I have known my children's wants:
Come mother me, my Lord,

and hold me to your breast
when all I held is lost.
So wordlessly croon me to rest,
your arms about me crossed.

O Christ, the Word of God,
if I should speak no more,
then be me for me the sounding word 
that praises and implores.

And if my heart is stone,
oh, give it voice to cry:
Let it be just your name alone
resounding to the sky.

Created 1408 by Andrej Rublëv. By Anonymous Russian icon painter (before 1917)Public domain image (according to PD-RusEmpire) – http://www.icon-art.info/masterpiece.php?lng=ru&mst_id=136, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1579041

Pietà

Did Eve hold Abel thus,
ev'n as she ached for Cain?
Was it for this she came of dust,
for this bore them of pain?

So Mary holds her son,
a swordpoint in her heart.
All prophecies are clanging gongs,
and silent stone cries out!

Yet even to this end,
our second-oldest tale,
even to this does God descend,
where weeping mothers wail.

So shall he fill the first,
our coming from the dust.
So shall he raise us from the dirt
who has lain there with us.

And tears shall turn to floods
that make the deserts bloom.
There will be no more Niles of blood,
when death has been entombed.

But, oh, how long, how long
shall Eve for Abel weep,
shall Mary hold her lifeless son,
and God his silence keep?

Michelangelo Buonarroti’s La Madonna della Pietà in Saint Peter’s Basilica, 1498–1499. Pontifically crowned by Pope Urban VIII in 1637. By Stanislav Traykov – Edited version of (cloned object out of background) Image:Michelangelo’s Pieta 5450 cropncleaned.jpg), CC BY 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3653602

As We Look On Death

Martha said to Jesus,
“Lord, if you had been here,
my brother would not have died.
But even now I know that whatever you ask of God,
God will give you.”
Jesus said to her,
“Your brother will rise.”
Martha said to him,
“I know he will rise,
in the resurrection on the last day.”
Jesus told her,
“I am the resurrection and the life;
whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live,
and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.
Do you believe this?”
She said to him, “Yes, Lord.
I have come to believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God,
the one who is coming into the world.”
John 11:1-45

You ask us, as we look on death,
to trust in resurrection;
to hope, beyond the end of breath,
that all our sighs are reckoned;
to love, though there is nothing left,
and say someone still beckons.

You stand with us outside the tomb
to mourn the one within it—
O, call him out again to you!
O'erturn the grave and spill it!
For we shall all go that way soon,
and you yourself shall fill it.

Here where the ground gapes open wide
and swallows all in shadow,
you come with us.  You step inside,
descend into death's furrow;
a seed stripped bare of pow'r or pride
is buried by the harrow.

You who had shaped us out of dust
as brief and weak as grass is,
who breathed your life into our mud,
are with us as it passes.
It fades, but you are still with us:
Breathe life into these ashes.

The Raising of Lazarus, 1310–11, By Duccio di Buoninsegna – Kimbell Art Museum, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=7125641

Annunciation 2023

For these readings:

As deep as the nether world
and as high as the sky,
here in her body curled
and hid from all eyes,

the Word that spoke everything,
all that is, in six days,
as silent as angels' wings
in her waters plays.

He vibrates to hear her now,
her heart and her voice,
the maid to whom angels bow
and sing out, “Rejoice!”

As all earth will tremble soon,
feel him flutter inside,
when darkness shall come at noon
and graves open wide:

So shall the world groan with her
when the moment draws near.
The Word will cry out for her
in blood and in tears.

Alla 18. Esposizione Biennale Internazionale di Arte del 1932 è presente con otto opere, tra cui l’Annunciazione in un Tempio d’Aria esempio di Arte Sacra e Futurismo. By Mlemmi – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=113266814

When Mercy Reached From Heav’n to Earth

When mercy reached from heav'n to earth,
forgiveness stretched out east to west,
the grass that springs up from the dirt
grew to a garden of the blest.

The barren ground of Calvary
now bears an ever-blooming rose.
The gates of Eden swinging free
encompass every flow'r that grows.

And we who sprang up with the dawn
to wither in the gath'ring dusk
find that we blossom on and on,
bear fruit that overflows the husk.

How can it be that we should bear
the grain of heav'n from earthly roots
unless the vine, with tender care,
entwines itself about our shoots?

O mercy, come to soak the ground
and drench the furrows where we sleep.
The heav'nly love that you pour down
will wash and wake the fallen seeds.

O Christ the blossom, Christ the vine,
transform the grasses into trees
where all the birds their shelter find
within the living shade of peace.

Holy church Maria of the Castle, Olivenza (Spain) By José Luis Filpo Cabana – Own work, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=44932624

Flesh and Blood

Flesh and blood for flesh and blood,
wounded for the wounded ones.
Mercy poured on us in flood:
From the chalice rim it runs.

God-with-us, incarnate Word,
hands and eyes and breath like ours,
stands here on the spinning world,
keeping time with our own hearts.

As if this were not enough—
skin-shawled heaven walking earth—
still in overflowing love
you remain, defiant of death.

From your fullness we receive
gift on gift and grace on grace.
More than mind or heart conceive,
soul and body have a taste.

More than hope could dare or dream,
now we hold you, masked as bread:
you who led us, who redeemed,
taken as the world is fed.

You who made us flesh and blood
shared with us this lifelong need.
We have shared in heaven's food:
Make us bread, your world to feed.

A Kremikovtsi Monastery fresco (15th century) depicting the Last Supper celebrated by Jesus and his disciples. The early Christians too would have celebrated this meal to commemorate Jesus’ death and subsequent resurrection. By Edal Anton Lefterov – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=15129262

Not As We See

Some of the Pharisees who were with him heard this
and said to him, “Surely we are not also blind, are we?”
Jesus said to them,
“If you were blind, you would have no sin;
but now you are saying, ‘We see,’ so your sin remains.
John 9:1-41

Not as we see do you see us,
we who always look at sin.
You look at the heart, O Jesus,
seeing all that lies within.

You, who worked in the beginning,
formed our eyes to see your face.
Work in us again, Redeemer:
We have lost the light of grace.

Squinting at your great creation
we see only spit and dust.
These you take, O Incarnation,
healing all that's blind in us.

Where we see but muck or beauty,
not the substance underneath,
come to us, O Word, refuting
all our willful disbelief.

Let us see as you have seen us
when you look beneath our skin:
children of the Father's goodness,
sinning, and yet more than sin.

You who made the eyes, restore them;
earth and water shape anew
so to see who stands before them:
Son of Man, let us see you.

Healing the blind who was blinded since birth By Pehr Hörberg – National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=97998397

Breastplate

From the Todd translation of St. Patrick, found on Wikipedia:

Christ of the compass-rose, draw near:
Show me the way each pilgrim goes.
Lead to the fore, yet guard the rear;
both on the right and the left, stay close.

Christ of ascending, hang above:
Cover my head and point my feet.
Be for me breastplate, shield, and glove;
Christ of the harrow, come beneath.

Christ the Incarnate, flesh and blood,
from Mary's ground, come dwell in mine.
Come with the strength of fire and flood,
stable as earth but with pow'r divine.

Christ in the fort, keep watch for me;
Christ in the hearthm bid me well-come.
Christ in the wheel and chariot-seat,
Christ in the proud stern, bring me home.

Saint Patrick Mosaic 1 by Boris Anrep. Christ the King Cathedral, Mullingar. Own Camera Work Peter Gavigan, May 2007 By Gavigan 01 at the English Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=7504400

Word

You are, eternal Word of God,
before our making or our Fall,
before Cain's rage or Noah's flood,
as if a word could hold God's all.

Untongued, you echoed into time;
inscribed before you made the hand;
begotten, bound into a sign
that we might hope to understand.

Not only for the weight of sin
were you delimited in flesh:
Before our souls were there to win,
in syllables you fenced yourself.

Infinity was circumscribed
before the dust you formed us of,
before that dust could need a Christ,
you limned divinity in love.

Christ Pantocrator By Unknown author – Unknown source, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5820582

Strike the Stone

For the third Sunday of Lent, Year A, for which the readings are about water in the desert and the Samaritan Woman:

Strike the stone, it flows with water;
strike the river, it is blood.
Strike the hearts of sons and daughters:
Turn us back to you, O God.

All our efforts unavailing,
all our labors merely vain:
Only you can re-create us;
you can make us whole again.

Take the half-truths we have cherished,
hearts divided, bodies sore:
Make them whole before we perish.
Heal us in our wounds, O Lord.

Not one place, but all creation,
then shall be your altar stone
where you offer us salvation,
where we worship you alone.

Not one body, one believer,
but all bodies joined as one,
whole in every part, O Jesus,
when your streams of mercy run.

Life eternal welling in us:
Let us drink and thirst no more.
Pour you healing grace upon us;
give us living water, Lord.