With Thee Conversing - A.D. Hope (1907 - 2000)

Sign on the side of the road leading into my hometown - Barrett Road, Vernon, NJ

Talking with you each day would seem
To pass unnoticed into night,
And, borne on that enchanted stream,
Time but its pulse of dark and light;

And even busied or apart,
I feel the currents restless sweep:
A conversation fills my heart,
Or voices answer in my sleep.

Nor does it move by words alone,
Beneath our smiles, our talk, beneath
All words, a colloquy goes on
Which runs as strong and still as death.

Where did it rise, that mighty flow
On which chance travelers, we embark?
What cordilleras feed with snow
Its cataracts raging through the dark,

I can not guess, nor yet foresee
What hour the flood, as we descend,
Will turn and sweep us to the sea
In which all rivers have their end.

Talking with you, I cease to care
Where the springs rise and where they flow;
The goal of all my search is here,
And here my everlasting Now. 

Ten years ago, I sang David Evan Thomas's setting of this poem. It popped into my head this morning, and I was again stunned by the beauty of the lines. I'm going to have to program this set (Grace &Stir: Three Poems by A.D. Hope) again in the near future.

Nothing Gold Can Stay - Robert Frost (1894-1963)

Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf,
So Eden sank to grief,
So Dawn goes down to day,
Nothing gold can stay.

I am not yours - Sara Teasdale (1884 - 1933)

I am not yours, not lost in you,
Not lost, although I long to be
Lost as a candle lit at noon,
Lost as a snowflake in the sea.

You love me, and I find you still
A spirit beautiful and bright,
Yet I am I, who long to be
Lost as a light is lost in light.

Oh plunge me deep in love -- put out
My senses, leave me deaf and blind,
Swept by the tempest of your love,
A taper in a rushing wind. 


_____________________

One of the perks of my new position is listening to choral music, and sometimes you come across a composer you never heard of who captures the music innate within one of your favorite poets. 
I Am Not Yours - Z. Randall Stroope  

Martha's Serenity of Mind - Father Bede Jarrett, O.P. (1881-1934)

I can not go forward until I have effected the subjection of myself; and when finally I overcome and enter into my kingdom, then only shall I achieved perfect freedom. I must begin with this, and thus I see the necessity of acquiring a spirit of detachment from all things in the sense of subordinating my will to the will of God, realizing by faith that I can not escape from it., that whatever happens comes to pass only because God has allowed it in His wisdom and His love. I must frequently meditate on this divine will.

Then again, I must try to be perfectly truthful in life; that my life should correspond absolutely to my thoughts. Once I start posing or pretending, I become a slave to pretense. Never shall I free myself until I revert to myself and am not content to act as others expect of me. Compromise, just because it is a lie can not be allowed within these limits that circumscribe truth. To be prudent, to be on my guard, yet to keep myself undisturbed, to possess my soul in patience-that is the great secret of life. Especially in these days, when everything is at a rush and hurry, I must take care to be in perfect serenity of mind, lest I add to the disturbance of existence and break in upon my peace of soul and perfect freedom, without which spiritual life is rendered impossible. - Father Bede Jarrett, O.P.


My Aunt Judy and I had a wonderful conversation over breakfast one morning. A few months later she handed this meditation for the feast of St. Martha to me. I've been carrying it with me for the past year. It has helped me to effect a restructuring of my priorities to be better centered and calm in the wake of some pretty rough storms this past year.

With all my heart

with all my heart
i wish

to sing you a song to make you smile
to hold you safe in my arms a while
to dance with you resting upon my shoulder
to dream of days when you will grow older
to laugh with you as I caress you awake
to cry with you should your heart break
to feel you again beneath my skin
to nestle you close under my chin
to watch you thrive in our house of mirth
to wrap you in cotton instead of earth

My darling boy, my angel, my own
with all my heart
i want you home.

Aloof - by Christina Rossetti (1830-1894)

THE irresponsive silence of the land,
   The irresponsive sounding of the sea,
   Speak both one message of one sense to me:--
Aloof, aloof, we stand aloof, so stand
Thou too aloof, bound with the flawless band
   Of inner solitude; we bind not thee;
   But who from thy self-chain shall set thee free?

What heart shall touch thy heart?
What hand thy hand?
And I am sometimes proud and sometimes meek,
   And sometimes I remember days of old
When fellowship seem'd not so far to seek,
   And all the world and I seem'd much less cold,
   And at the rainbow's foot lay surely gold,
And hope felt strong, and life itself not weak.

I dreamed - For F. J. J.

I dreamed I held you.
And not just waking, whimsical daydreams
of light and innocence.

But in the fullness of night when visceral passions
Infuse every muscle with knowing.
I held you.

I reached through my skin.
Held you warm, and earthy in my arms.
Minute perfection, blazing and pulsing with life
Vital and healthy and whole.
Enveloped in the divinely crafted,
Interwoven nest of my hands.

Once, I dreamed I handed you to your father,
Whose brow is your largest mirror,
Whose heart is likewise etched
With the knowledge of your being.

Your existence is not for scientific speculation.
Nor a weapon in spiritual revolution or political debate. It is fact.
True as the existence of all the heavenly bodies.

The stars, of which you are made,
Are not merely theoretical
For humanity's frail inability to touch them.

For F. J. J.

Jennifer D. Behnke - June 7, 2014 - 4:35am