Journeys

The souls of the dead are in your hand—
but take the living, too,
who wander over sea and land,
and see us safely through.

For though our eyes are wide and bright,
we cannot see the way.
The light of noon is dark as night
and hides the coming days.

The wings of dawn will bear us far—
what dangers wait us there?
Be with us ever, guide and guard,
in all that we shall bear!

For we must go beyond the seas,
leave all we know behind.
We journey 'til all journeys cease—
Be with us, and be kind!

You see what cannot e'er be seen;
you knew me ere my birth.
You knit me in my inmost being
and drew me from the earth—

Then you will not let go of me,
the labor of your hands.
Though I go where I cannot see,
beside me there you'll stand.

L’aurore, Mer du Nord by Guillaume Vogels, c. 1877 – Robert Moyens: Guillaume Vogels 150 Jaar, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4671281

Magnificat

For the Feast of the Assumption:

Let all that hides within my heart,
that dwells within my soul,
show forth the burning light of God
and magnify the Lord.

For he was not too great to look
upon my littleness,
but from it his own smallness took—
and all will call me blessed.

My God did not refuse to see,
so I am not ashamed.
No, he has done great things for me
and holy is his name.

His mercy flows from age to age
as mountain streams pour down.
The poor he shelters in his strength
and scatters all the proud.

The mighty fall beneath his gaze;
the low are lifted up;
and see! he send the rich away
and fills the beggar's cup!

For he has not forgotten us
through all our wand'ring days,
but shapes his mercy from our dust.
Oh, let my soul sing praise!

Drawing; Drawings By Pierre-Paul Prud’hon – This file was donated to Wikimedia Commons as part of a project by the Metropolitan Museum of Art. See the Image and Data Resources Open Access Policy, CC0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=60840413

Eat

Before the breaking of the bread
or walking on the sea,
before your rest in manger-bed
or Mary's “let it be,”
before you spoke and bid us hear
or our own tongues unfurled,
before our hunger called you near
you fed us in the world.

You did not wait 'til Bethlehem
to join us in the dust,
nor for the new Jerusalem
to break your bread with us,
but you who kneaded Eden's soil
to sculpt us as your face
you labored with us in our toil,
in our meals took your place.

There's not a crumb upon the board
that did not come from you,
and whether we could see you, Lord,
or not, you lay there, too.
You made the stomach of our need
and made it to be filled.
You made yourself the bread we eat,
and you will feed us still.

Slab stele from mastaba tomb of Itjer at Giza. 4th Dynasty, 2543–2435 BC. Itjer is seated at a table with slices of bread, shown vertical by convention. Egyptian Museum, Turin. Photo By Ian Alexander – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=54612130

Manna

“I am the bread of life.
Your ancestors ate the manna in the desert, but they died;
this is the bread that comes down from heaven
so that one may eat it and not die.
I am the living bread that came down from heaven;
whoever eats this bread will live forever;
and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.”
—John 6:41-51

You sank your fingers in the earth
to dredge the furrows of our birth
and planted first a garden there
with seeds you made, all good to bear.

All times and seasons you have set
to plow and plant, to reap and rest.
You turn the earth and send it rain,
and you yourself prepare the grain.

So all we harvest is your gift:
You fill the empty hands we lift;
you fill the earth to stir the seed;
you fill us, too, who see our need.

Not earth's alone, but heaven's bread
you give us, Lord, and we are fed.
As every day we eat and live,
our life is in the bread you give.

You are yourself the bread of life,
and those who eat will never die,
no more as seeds to fall and sleep
but evermore your feast to keep.

Though still we hunger, knowing this
our daily bread a foretaste is.
You grow and bless; we take and eat,
and every bite is manna sweet.

Albert Samuel Anker – Still-Life with Coffee, Bread and Potatoes By Albert Anker – http://www.sightswithin.com/Search/albert%20anker/Page_2/, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=37060415

Peaches

The blessings of the Lord will come
as peaches weighing down the boughs
and bushels overwhelmed with plums
in summer days without a cloud,

as sweet as cherries on the stem
whose taste you long for all the year—
You feast on shadows until then
and wait while ripening time draws near,

remembering how the juices run
down chins, and lips and tongues drip joy
enough and more for everyone
in song and summer's feast employed.

That memory in you is wine.
Like summer rain, let it pour down,
distilled from every branch and vine.
You need not turn the world around.

The light will lengthen, fruit grow ripe,
and feast be spread beneath the trees
in days that know no hint of strife,
in peace beside the restful stream.

Though you are winter, spring will come.
Though you are barren, peaches grow.
The Lord will fill your hands with plums
in feasts beyond all you have known.

Still Life with Peaches and Yellow Pot By Pierre Bonnard – https://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/detail.php?ID=139492, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=70363945

Peter on Tabor

Then Peter said to Jesus in reply, 
“Rabbi, it is good that we are here!
Let us make three tents: 
one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.”
He hardly knew what to say, they were so terrified.
Then a cloud came, casting a shadow over them; 
from the cloud came a voice, 
“This is my beloved Son. Listen to him.”
—Mark 9:2-10

'Tis good, Lord, to be here,
to see with my own eyes
yourself, O Rabbi, dazzling clear
against the cloud-dark skies.

Oh!  Let me build a shrine—
let me forever stay
here where I see your glory shine,
here in eternal day.

Take not the downward road—
I'm clinging to the height!
Down in the valley, shadows grow—
Why must you hide the light?

Better to stay up here—
Oh, but they call you down,
down to the wounds that must be healed,
the lost that must be found.

If you must, so must I—
you're my beloved, too.
Where you go, I go—live or die,
I still will follow you—

and where you stand, I'll stand,
someday to stand in joy,
for you are my true promised land;
you are my still, small voice.

Then let us go, my Lord,
down to Jersusalem.
I know you will show me light once more
in your endless day.  Amen.

Transfiguration of Jesus  By Raphael – Downloaded from Artist Hideout, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=379381

Hunger

So they said to him,
“Sir, give us this bread always.”
Jesus said to them,
“I am the bread of life;
whoever comes to me will never hunger,
and whoever believes in me will never thirst.”
–John 6:24-35

I believe, but still I hunger;
Lord, I trust you and I thirst
as if all we have are crumbs here
in the desert of our hurt.
There are days that have no comfort,
nights when all is at its worst,
and we long for signs and wonders,
manna scattered on the dirt.

Bread of life, true bread from heaven,
every day I eat my fill
yet I wake each morning empty,
hunger crying for you still.
Let me take the bread you give me,
take the cup where mercy spills;
let it tell me of forgiveness,
that my cries shall yet be stilled.

For the bread is you, O Savior:
We will eat and we will live,
and the wine we are partaking
is your life upon our lips.
Though I rise again unsated,
let me kneel today for this:
heaven's feast of your own making
that some day shall be my bliss.

The Gathering of the Manna by James Tissot – https://thejewishmuseum.org/collection/26365-the-gathering-of-the-manna, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=8849141

All & Sundry

I bring my all and sundry,
O God, to worship you,
but all of me is nothing
and fades away as dew.
How can I taste these wonders
with naught to offer you?
I leave the table hungry
and hide me from your view.

For some have brought you silver,
and some have brought you gold,
a flame to smelt the impure
and melt the heart that's cold,
or notes of horns and cymbals
to stir the brave and bold,
or they have brought you simply
your own love, ages old.

But all my love is feeble
and withers ere it starts,
as all my songs are greedy,
to ply you with my art.
Yet, Lord, you love the needy,
the shattered, and the scarred:
Then shall I let you see me,
my weak and worthless heart?

So if you want it, take it
for any good you'll get.
Oh, I would give you greatness
if I had any yet.
Here I lay on your table
the little I possess:
Take what the days are breaking
and turn it to your bread.


Gold Solidus of Roman Emperor Valentinian II By Photographed by: York Museums Trust Staff – This file originated on the York Museums Trust Online Collection. YMT hosted a GLAMwiki partnership in 2013/14.This tag does not indicate the copyright status of the attached work. A normal copyright tag is still required. See Commons:Licensing., CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=38984357

Good Ground

And he spoke to them at length in parables, saying:
“A sower went out to sow.
And as he sowed, some seed fell on the path,
and birds came and ate it up.
Some fell on rocky ground, where it had little soil.
It sprang up at once because the soil was not deep,
and when the sun rose it was scorched,
and it withered for lack of roots.
Some seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it.
But some seed fell on rich soil, and produced fruit,
a hundred or sixty or thirtyfold.
Whoever has ears ought to hear.”
—Matthew 13: 1-9

As if the sower scatters blind
on rocks and brambles he can't see—
or as he gives the ground its time
to show what it will come to be.

The dirt road where the birds swoop down,
that verges on an empty field,
still has its cracks where seeds can sprout,
and God alone knows what it yields.

The field beside it springing green:
Who knows how deep its richness runs?
The flowers each new morning brings
tomorrow wither in the sun.

And everywhere the hidden thorns
whose roots and runner choke new life,
whose tendrils crown each seedling born
with daily care and daily strife.

But you are not content to plow
the tended earth in lines and rows:
You seek the lost, farflung good ground,
and where you find it, there you sow.

Then cast your harvest in my soul,
O Christ the sower wasting seeds.
O spendthrift, foolish prodigal,
grow all the good there is in me.
Dirt road in Fremont, California DCIM\100GOPRO By Benefactor123 – Own work, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=21865562

What Good?

When Jesus raised his eyes
and saw that a large crowd was coming to him,
he said to Philip,
“Where can we buy enough food for them to eat?”
He said this to test him,
because he himself knew what he was going to do.
Philip answered him,
“Two hundred days’ wages worth of food would not be enough
for each of them to have a little.”
One of his disciples,
Andrew, the brother of Simon Peter, said to him,
“There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish;
but what good are these for so many?”
—John 6:1-15

To the tune FINLANDIA:

What good is this, the little I can offer?
All I can give, O God, is just myself:
This heart fails love; this body breaks and suffers;
this mind sees not, turned inward on itself.
As nothing worth, this pittance that I proffer,
as these few loaves and fish you take and bless.

As once you took the mud that I am made of
and clothed yourself in human littleness.
You laid it out as bread for us to savor,
poured out as wine, salvation on our lips.
They were so small—five wounds that pierced two natures—
how can you feed a multitude with this?

Yet it is so, O bread come down from heaven:
You took our life and clothed yourself in dust,
yet not our sin; untainted by our leaven,
poured yourself out to fill the blessing cup
that we might drink and live and be forgiven.
Our weaknesses transformed into your love.

Then take these gifts that in my hands are nothing.
Take for your own my heart and mind and strength.
If you transform them to a wondrous something,
let it be so, for you can do all things.
Or leave me still my self as you'd begun it:
It is still good, and yours in every length.

The feeding of the five thousand; Christ blessing fishes in left background; the apostles with large baskets in foreground; illustration to William of Auvergne, ‘Postilla super Epistolas et Evangelia’, Basel; Michael Furter, 1511. 1511 Woodcut By Print made by: Urs Graf – https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/P_1927-0614-125, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=89886988