Placelore

Witness

The lonely wind

cuts my tears

apart

falling in the cold rain,

how beautiful

the fragrant flowers of Spring.

 

 

 

 

What is I am

Hold me
so that I may go
falling into the tears
of life
for this is
I am.

Enfold me
in your arms
so I may feel safely
the pain which prepares,
cleanses me for being
within

and after
will you accept me
through the ages
when all has died
but the face of
what is
I am

Through the Wound

Through the wound comes the healing:

a relationship formed

in the tenderness of loss,

the little girl lost

the little boy searching for God

 

their roots became twisted:

searching through the ages

towards a death un-relinquished

as they climbed the high mountain

towards a cross on a precipice 

offered long ago 

to the torment of the wind.

 

Atop stood a raven

ancient and humbled

being of the worlds

it plucked their false comfort

and wept,

for the death un-relinquished. 

The Bright Field

I have seen the sun break through
to illuminate a small field
for a while, and gone my way
and forgotten it. But that was the
pearl of great price, the one field that had
treasure in it. I realise now
that I must give all that I have
to possess it. Life is not hurrying

on to a receding future, nor hankering after
an imagined past. It is the turning
aside like Moses to the miracle
of the lit bush, to a brightness
that seemed as transitory as your youth
once, but is the eternity that awaits you.

 

'The Bright Field' by R. S. Thomas

Point of Creation

 

Take me to the point of my creation,
Take me where my life began.
I was born into this world,
What had I intended then?
What had I chosen for a destiny,
Am I living it right now?
I have this feeling I’ve forgotten something.
Tell me, how do I know that I am where I’m supposed to be?
Talk to me, God,
I know you’re listening to me.

Open up your eyes, look to the sky,
You’ll see a rainbow,
That’s the bridge you crossed,
On your way to your new life.
Breathe in, breathe out,
Let the color rays pass through you.
Red, orange, yellow, green,
Turquoise, indigo, purple.
Now do you see where your home is?
Do you remember who you are?
Life’s longing for itself,
Your wish made upon a star.
 

Marketa Irglova

http://youtu.be/36KOs2cQhWk

 

 

 

Loneliness

The Lonliness One dare not sound –

And would as soon surmise

As in its Grave go plumbing

To ascertain the size –

 

The Loneliness whose worst alarm

Is lest itself should see –

And perish from before itself

For just a scrutiny –

 

The Horror not to be surveyed –

But skirted in the Dark –

With Consciousness suspended –

And Being under Lock –

 

I fear me this – is Loneliness

The Maker of the soul

Its Caverns and its Corridors

Illuminate - or seal -

 

Emily Dickinson

 

 

The Right Thing

 

Let others probe the mystery if they can.

Time-harried prisoners of Shall and Will-

The right thing happens to the happy man.

The bird flies out, the bird flies back again;
The hill becomes the valley, and is still;
Let others delve that mystery if they can.

God bless the roots!-Body and soul are one!
The small become the great, the great the small;
The right thing happens to the happy man.

Child of the dark, he can out leap the sun,
His being single, and that being all:
The right thing happens to the happy man.

Or he sits still, a solid figure when
The self-destructive shake the common wall;
Takes to himself what mystery he can,

And, praising change as the slow night comes on,
Wills what he would, surrendering his will
Till mystery is no more: No more he can.
The right thing happens to the happy man. 

 

Theodore Roethke

 

 

 

 

 

Old Year and New

 

And now we welcome the new year. Full of things that have never been.

Rainer Maria Rilke

So — Twelve months ago — We breathed — Then dropped the Air — Which bore it best? Was this — the patientest — Because it was a Child, you know — And could not value — Air? If to be “Elder” — mean most pain — I’m old enough, today, I’m certain — then — As old as thee — how soon? One — Birthday more — or Ten? Let me — choose! Ah, Sir, None! Emily Dickinson

 

Quiet friend

 

Quiet friend who has come so far,

feel how your breathing makes more space around you.

Let this darkness be a bell tower

and you the bell. As you ring,

 

what batters you becomes your strength.

Move back and forth into the change.

What is it like, such intensity of pain?

If the drink is bitter, turn yourself to wine.

 

In this uncontainable night,

be the mystery at the crossroads of your senses,

the meaning discovered there.

 

And if the world has ceased to hear you,

say to the silent earth: I flow.

To the rushing water, speak: I am.

 

Rilke Sonnets to Orpheus II, 29

 

______________________

 

'The complex remains, and the lacunae; that which becomes different are our connections with these places and our reflections through them. It is as if to change we must keep in touch with the changeless, which also implies taking change for what it is, rather than in terms of development. Evolution tends to become a "means of disowning the past" (T. S. Eliot); what we want to change we wish to be rid of.'

 

The Essential James Hillman, A Blue Fire, Routledge, 1994  P.160

I Live My Life

 

I live my life in growing orbits
which move out over the things of the world.
Perhaps I can never achieve the last,
but that will be my attempt.

I am circling around God, around the ancient tower,
and I have been circling for a thousand years,
and I still don’t know if I am a falcon,

Or a storm, or a great song.

 

Rainer Maria Rilke (4 December 1875 – 29 December 1926)