The Winter's Spring

The winter comes; I walk alone,
I want no bird to sing;
To those who keep their hearts their own
The winter is the spring.
No flowers to please--no bees to hum--
The coming spring's already come.

I never want the Christmas rose
To come before it's time;
The seasons, each as God bestows,
Are simple and sublime.
I love to see the snowstorm hing;
'Tis but the winter garb of spring.

I never want the grass to bloom:
The snowstorm's best in white.
I love to see the tempest come
And love it's piercing light.
The dazzled eyes that love to cling
O'er snow-white meadows sees the spring.

I love the snow, the crumbling snow
That hangs on everything.
It covers everything below
Like white dove's brooding wing,
A landscape to the aching sight,
A vast expanse of dazzing light.

It is the foliage of the woods
That winters bring--the dress,
White Easter of the year in bud,
That makes the winter Spring.
The frost and snow his poises bring,
Nature's white sporuts of the spring.

John Clare (1793 - 1864)

Poem in October

 
It was my thirtieth year to heaven*
Woke to my hearing from harbour and neighbour wood
And the mussel pooled and the heronPriested shore
The morning beckon
With water praying and call of seagull and rook
And the knock of sailing boats on the net webbed wall
Myself to set foot
That second
In the still sleeping town and set forth.

My birthday began with the water-
Birds and the birds of the winged trees flying my name
Above the farms and the white horses
And I rose
In rainy autumnAnd walked abroad in a shower of all my days.
High tide and the heron dived when I took the road
Over the border
And the gates
Of the town closed as the town awoke.

A springful of larks in a rolling
Cloud and the roadside bushes brimming with whistling
Blackbirds and the sun of October
Summery
On the hill's shoulder,
Here were fond climates and sweet singers suddenly
Come in the morning where I wandered and listened
To the rain wringing
Wind blow cold
In the wood faraway under me.

Pale rain over the dwindling harbour
And over the sea wet church the size of a snail
With its horns through mist and the castle
Brown as owls
But all the gardens
Of spring and summer were blooming in the tall tales
Beyond the border and under the lark full cloud.
There could I marvel
My birthday
Away but the weather turned around.

It turned away from the blithe country
And down the other air and the blue altered sky
Streamed again a wonder of summer
With apples
Pears and red currants
And I saw in the turning so clearly a child's
Forgotten mornings when he walked with his mother
Through the parables
Of sun light
And the legends of the green chapels

And the twice told fields of infancy
That his tears burned my cheeks and his heart moved in mine.
These were the woods the river and seaWhere a boy
In the listening
Summertime of the dead whispered the truth of his joy
To the trees and the stones and the fish in the tide.
And the mystery
Sang alive
Still in the water and singingbirds.

And there could I marvel my birthday
Away but the weather turned around. And the true
Joy of the long dead child sang burning
In the sun.
It was my thirtieth
Year to heaven* stood there then in the summer noon
Though the town below lay leaved with October blood.
O may my heart's truth
Still be sung
On this high hill in a year's turning.                         

---Dylan Thomas, 1944 (Welsh)   

*A person alive 30 years, that far along his journey to heaven.

It's Grand

Recent anniversary trip up to the Grand Canyon:

 

Elk

Scrub Jay

 

Mule Deer



 

 

 

Bird Room

Still at it with the new house: now it's the settling in for this new year.  The kitchen/dining area has a real "bird theme", which relates to this blog.  I often hear birds singing outside, despite living in this metro area: 

 

Song of the Three Young Men

 

Blessed are You, O Lord God of our fathers: and to be praised and exalted above all for ever.

And blessed is Your glorious and holy Name: and to be praised and exalted above all for ever.

Blessed are You in the Temple of Your holy glory: and to be praised and glorified above all for ever.

Blessed are You who looks upon the depths, and sits upon the Cherubim [fiery angels; statues of these were atop the Ark of the Covenant in the Jewish Temple]: and to be praised and exalted above all for ever.

Blessed are You on the glorious Throne of Your kingdom: and to be praised and glorified above all for ever.

Blessed are You in the vaults of heaven: and above all to be praised and glorified for ever.

O all you works of the Lord, bless  the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O you heavens, bless  the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O you Angels of the Lord, bless the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O all you waters above the heavens, bless ye the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O all you powers of the Lord, bless the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O you Sun and Moon, bless the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O you stars of heaven, bless ye the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O every shower and dew, bless the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O all you winds, bless the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O you fire and heat, bless the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O you dews and storms of snow, bless the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O you nights and days, bless the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O you light and darkness, bless the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O you ice and cold, bless  the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O you frost and snow, bless the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O you lightning and clouds, bless the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O let the earth bless the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O you mountains and little hills, bless the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O all you things that grow on the earth, bless  the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O you fountains, bless the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O you seas and rivers, bless the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O you whales and all that move in the waters, bless  the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O all you birds of the air, bless the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O all you beasts and cattle, bless the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever...

O you servants of the Lord, bless the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O you spirits and souls of the righteous, bless ye the Lord, praise and exalt Him above all for ever.

O you holy and humble men of heart, bless ye the Lord: praise and exalt Him above all for ever...

O give thanks unto the Lord, because He is gracious: for His loving-kindness lasts forever.

 

--the alleged song of the men who sang while in the fiery furnace.  From an apocryphal section inserted after Daniel 3:23.

Song (Two Doves Upon The Selfsame Branch)

Two doves upon the selfsame branch,
  Two lilies on a single stem,
Two butterflies upon one flower:--
  O happy they who look on them.

Who look upon them hand in hand
  Flushed in the rosy summer light;
Who look upon them hand in hand
  And never give a thought to night.

--- Christina Rossetti  (1830 - 1894)  

(Although this poem is not specifically Christian, the poetess was)

A Thunder-Storm

[The summer monsoon season should soon be coming to the mountain West]

The wind begun to rock the grass
With threatening tunes and low, -
He flung a menace at the earth,
A menace at the sky.

The leaves unhooked themselves from trees
And started all abroad;
The dust did scoop itself like hands
And throw away the road. . .

The birds put up the bars to nests,
The cattle fled to barns;
There came one drop of giant rain,
And then, as if the Hands

That held the dams had parted hold,
The waters wrecked the sky,
But overlooked my father's house,
Just quartering a tree.

  ---Emily Dickinson

May Magnificat*

(Happy Mother's Day!)**

May is Mary's month, and I
Muse at that and wonder why:
Her feasts follow reason,
Dated due to season—

Flesh and fleece, fur and feather,
Grass and greenworld all together;
Star-eyed strawberry-breasted
Throstle above bird nested

Cluster of bugle blue eggs thin
Forms and warms the life within;
And bird and blossom swell
In sod or sheath or shell.

All things rising, all things sizing
Mary saw, sympathising
With that world of good,
Nature's motherhood.

Their magnifying of each its kind
With delight calls to mind
How she did in her stored
Magnify the Lord.

Well but there was more than this:
Spring's universal bliss
Much, had much to say
To offering Mary May.

When drop-of-blood-and-foam-dapple
Bloom lights the orchard-apple
And thicket and thorp are merry
With silver-surfed cherry

And azuring-over greybell makes
Wood banks and brakes wash wet like lakes
And magic cuckoocall
Caps, clears, and clinches all—

This ecstasy all through mothering earth
Tells Mary her mirth till Christ's birth
To remember and exultation
In God who was her salvation.       

---Gerard Manley Hopkins, 1878

[edited for prominent Roman Catholic Marian theology; cmb, 2013]

*Mary's song during her pregnancy with Christ:  "My soul magnifies the Lord..."
**Rose & Blue are traditionally "Mary's colors."  Blue for faithfulness & Rose for femininity, motherhood & the color of the fresh, pure rose.

The Blue Jay

(excerpts from a longer poem)


No brigadier throughout the year

So civic as the jay.

A neighbor and a warrior, too,

With shrill felicity.

The pillow of this daring head

Is pungent evergreens;

His larder--terse and militant--

Unknown, refreshing things.

Stellar & Blue Jay
(usually do not share range)

His character a tonic,

His future a dispute;

Unfair an immortality

That leaves this neighbor out.* 

      ---Emily Dickinson

*Romans 8 promises that all creation will be restored in heaven.  Others argue that animals won't go to heaven because they don't have immortal souls.  Hence the debate.       

Savior-Creator

"The wild animals honor Me:
The jackals and the owls
Because I provide water in the desert
And streams in the wasteland
To give drink to my people, My chosen,
The people I formed for Myself
So that they might declare My praise...

I, even I, am Yahweh,

And apart from Me there is no Savior."   Isaiah 43:19b-21; 11

May

I cannot tell you how it was, 

But this I know: it came to pass 

Upon a bright and sunny day 

When May was young; ah, pleasant May! 

As yet the poppies were not born 

Between the blades of tender corn;

The last egg had not hatched as yet,

Nor any bird foregone its mate*. 

I cannot tell you what it was, 

But this I know: it did but pass. 

It passed away with sunny May, 

Like all sweet things it passed away, 

And left me old, and cold, and gray. 

---Christina Rossetti, (1830-1894) 

detail from a tablecloth sold by Vermont Country Store

*in the world of birds, many males leave their mates after the babies are old enough to fly away

Pied Beauty (Redux)

Always nice to repeat some of Hopkins work:

Glory be to God for dappled things,For skies of couple-color as a brindled cow,
For rose-moles in stipple** upon trout that swim.Fresh-firecoal chestnut falls***, finches' wings;
Landscape plotted and pieced---fold, fallow, and plough;
And all trades, their gear and tackle and trim.All things counter, spare, original, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled, (who knows how?)With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:Praise Him.
---Gerard Manley Hopkins, 1877

*Pied: Having patches of more than one color; i.e. the "Pied Piper"
**Rose-colored dots or flecks
***Fallen chestnuts, red as burning coals

 

Epiphany

'Lord Babe, if Thou art He We sought for patiently, 

Where is Thy court? 

Hither may prophecy and star resort; 

Men heed not their report.' – 

'Bow down and worship, righteous man: 

This Infant of a span 

Is He man sought for since the world began!' – 

'Then, Lord, accept my gold, too base a thing 

For Thee, of all kings King.' – 

'Lord Babe, despite Thy youth 

I hold Thee of a truth 

Both Good and Great: 

But wherefore dost Thou keep so mean a state, 

Low-lying desolate?' – 

'Bow down and worship, righteous seer: 

The Lord our God is here 

Approachable, Who bids us all draw near.' – 

'Wherefore to Thee I offer frankincense, 

Thou Sole Omnipotence.' – 

'But I have only brought Myrrh; no wise afterthought Instructed me 

To gather pearls or gems, or choice to see 

Coral or ivory.' – 

'Not least thine offering proves thee wise: 

For myrrh means sacrifice, 

And He that lives, this Same is He that dies.' – 

'Then here is myrrh: alas, yea woe is me 

That myrrh befitteth Thee.' – 

Myrrh, frankincense, and gold: 

And lo from wintry fold 

Good-will doth bring A Lamb, the innocent likeness of this King Whom stars and seraphs sing: 

And lo the bird of love, a Dove, 

Flutters and coos above: 

And Dove and Lamb and Babe agree in love: – 

Come all mankind, come all creation hither,

Come, worship Christ together. --Christina Rosetti; Before 1886

Who Am I?

Dietrich Bonhöffer, a young [Lutheran] theologian of great promise [from the German state church], was martyred by the Nazis for his participation in a plot against the life of Adolf Hitler. His writings have greatly influenced recent theological thought. This article appeared in the Journal Christianity and Crisis, March 4, 1946. [Some Lutherans question the depth or expression of his Lutheran theology, but this is a moving poem, regardless.]

Who am I? 

They often tell me
I stepped from my cell’s confinement
Calmly, cheerfully, firmly,
Like a squire from his country-house.
Who am I? They often tell me
I used to speak to my warders
Freely and friendly and clearly,
As though it were mine to command.
Who am I? They also tell me
I bore the days of misfortune
Equally, smilingly, proudly,
Like one accustomed to win.

Am I then really all that which other men tell of?
Or am I only what I myself know of myself?
Restless and longing and sick, like a bird in a cage,
Struggling for breath, as though hands were
compressing my throat,
Yearning for colors, for flowers, for the voices of birds,
Thirsting for words of kindness, for neighborliness,
Tossing in expectation of great events,
Powerlessly trembling for friends at an infinite distance,
Weary and empty at praying, at thinking, at making,
Faint, and ready to say farewell to it all?

Who am I? This or the other?
Am I one person today and tomorrow another?
Am I both at once? A hypocrite before others,
And before myself a contemptibly woebegone weakling?
Or is something within me still like a beaten army,
Fleeing in disorder from victory already achieved?
Who am I? They mock me, these lonely questions of mine.
Whoever I am, Thou knowest, 0 God, I am Thine!* ----Dietrich Bonhoeffer; March 4,1945
*Because Jesus died on the cross for us

Music on the Wing*

Let me be to Thee as the circling bird,
Or bat with tender and air-crisping wings
That shapes in half-light his departing rings**,
from both of whom a changeless note is heard.

I have found my music in a common word,
Trying each pleasurable throat that sings
And every praised sequence of sweet strings,
And know infallibly which I preferred.

The authentic cadence was discovered late
Which ends those only strains that I approve,
and other science all gone out of date
And minor sweetness scarce made mention of;
I have found the dominant of my range*** and state--
Love, O my God, to call Thee Love and Love.
---Gerard Manley Hopkins, 1865
*Originally untitled
**The bats circling to depart at sunset ("half-light")
***The author found his "true singing voice" late, or so he says. His "range" (literally, how low & high one can sing) is all wrapped up in Love for God. (This love can come only as a response to knowing that Christ has died for our sins.)

Spring "Song"

(from "Pippa Passes")
The year's at the spring
And day's at the morn;
Morning's at seven;
The hill-side's dew-pearled;
The lark's on the wing;
The snail's on the thorn:
God's in His heaven---
And all's right with the world*!
---Robert Burns
*Well, sort of. The natural world goes along with a lot of beautiful & good things in it; but it, too, is damaged by sin.

KEE L'Oh-LAHM CHas-DOE

...For His lovingkindness lasts to eternity. (Psalm 136:10). 

As I went for a walk 

On legs that are able, 

I praise You, 

For I am fearfully and wonderfully made; 

I revel in leaves 

And a family picnic table. 

Your works are wonderful, 

How rightly I realize this! (Ps. 139:14) 

...His lovingkindness lasts to eternity.

High above arches the pale blue dome 

On which billowy white clouds have been hung; 

He causes the clouds to rise 

From the ends of the earth... 

I breath in autumn 

With clear, healthy lungs. 

And brings out the wind 

From within His storehouses. (Ps. 135:7) 

...His lovingkindness lasts to eternity. 

Fuzzy brown squirrels 

Are storing up food... 

The eyes of all look unto You, 

For You give them their food in the right season. 

And I munch an apple~ 

Sensing all that is good. 

You open up Your Hand 

And satisfy the wants of all living things. (Ps. 145:15-16) 

...His lovingkindness lasts to eternity. 

My health is restored 

As only He could; 

Who forgives all my sins 

And heals my diseases; 

My strength is as birds' wings 

Going south as they should. 

He satisfies my desires with good things 

So that my strength is renewed like the eagle's. (Ps. 103: 3, 5) 

...His lovingkindness lasts to eternity. 

Tiny purple asters and once-lush green grass 

Now ready for fall are dying away. 

Man ~ his days are as grass, 

He flourishes as a flower of the field; 

Autumn reminds me that I, too, shall die 

To live again in a glorious new day. 

The wind blows over it and it is not, 

And its own place remembers it no more. (Ps. 103:15-16) 

...His lovingkindness lasts to eternity. 

The cold nips my nose 

As I kick about leaves... 

He spreads His snow as soft wool 

And scatters the frost as if ashes; 

Thinking about winter 

With drifts to my knees. 

He hurls down His ice like pebbles~ 

Who can stand before His cold? (Ps. 147:16-17) 

...His lovingkindness lasts to eternity. 

I trust in my Father 

Who looks out for me; 

Create in me a clean heart, O, God 

And renew an upright spirit within me. 

He takes away my sins, 

And I'll praise Him eternally. 

O, my Lord, open up my lips 

So that my mouth might declare Your praise. (Ps. 51:10,15) 

Deep inside, I let out a sigh, 

For You, O, Jesus, are always close by. 

Because I know You, 

I sense You all around me 

And on a day like today, 

I'm just "happy to be." 

Praise Yahweh! Give thanks unto Yahweh, For He is good; For His lovingkindness Lasts to eternity. (Ps. 136:1) ---(c) C. Marie Byars, 1984; Winfield, KS

Children of the Heavenly Father

Children of the Heavenly Father
Safely in His bosom gather;
Nestling bird nor star in heaven*
Such a refuge e'er was given.

God His own doth tend and nourish
In His holy courts they flourish.
From all evil things He spares them**;
In His mighty arms He bears them.

Neither life nor death shall ever
From the Lord His children sever**.
Unto them His grace He showeth
And their sorrows all He knoweth.

Though He giveth or He taketh
God His children ne'er forsaketh***;
His the loving purpose solely
To preserve them pure and holy.

---Karoline Sandell-Berg (Swedish), 1858; translated Ernst W. Olson

*Jesus said, "Aren't two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them falls to the ground apart from your Father's will. And even the hairs of your head are numbered. So stop being afraid: you are worth much more than many sparrows." Matthew 10:30. (Another song verse not given here--because it was clumsy in its translation---speaks of the numbering of the hairs.)
**Romans 8:28-39. God brings good out of all things and nothing can separate us from the love of God, not even death.
***When Job's first troubles came, he responded by saying, "Naked came I from my mother's womb and naked shall I return there [the dark "womb" of the grave]. Yahweh gives and He takes away; blessed be the Name of Yahweh." Job 1:21.

Vivaldi's "Summer"

[This continues the series of sonnets Antonio Vivaldi wrote to accompany & explain each of his "Four Seasons" concertos.]

In a harsh season burned by the sun,
Man and flock languish,
And the pine tree is scorched;
The cuckoo unleashes its voice, and soon
We hear the songs of the turtle-dove and the goldfinch.

Sweet Zephyr* blows, but Boreas** suddenly
Opens a dispute with his neighbor;
And the shepherd laments his fate,
For he fears a fierce squall is coming.

His weary limbs are robbed of rest
By his fear of fierce thunder and lightning
And by the furious swarm of flies and blowflies.

Alas, his fears are only too real:
The sky fills with thunder and lightning,
And hailstorms hew off the heads of proud cornstalks.

*A sweet, gently warm west wind
**A cold, fierce north wind (in large, flat countries, the collision of these two can brew tornadoes)
[obviously, Vivaldi was not a big fan of summer]

Spring

Nothing is so beautiful as Spring
When weeds, in wheels, shoot long and lovely and lush;
Thrush's eggs look little low heavens*, and thrush**
Through the echoing timber does so rise and wring
The ear, it strides like lightnings to hear him sing;
The glassy peartree leaves and blooms, they brush
The descending blue; that blue is all in a rush
With richness; the racing limbs, too, have fair their fling.

What is all this juice and all this joy?
A strain of the earth's sweet being in the beginning
In Eden garden---have, get before it cloy***
Innocent mind and Mayday**** in girl and boy,
Most, O Maid's Child*****,
Thy choice and worth the winning.
---Gerard Manley Hopkins, may 1877

*Eggs the color of the sky & reminders of it
**Thrush: the songbird, not the yeast-related infection (ha, ha!!)
***Cloy: to satiate, us. w/something pleasing. Basically, hurry to enjoy this fleeting reminder of Eden before it is spoiled, as the first Eden was by sin
****Mayday: May 1st. Celebrated in Europe with flowers & folk dances. (Happy Mayday! Also, Blessed Ascension. This year, the day commemorating Jesus's bodily Ascension through the clouds, after which we could no longer see Him physically, is also May 1st.)
*****Maid's Child: The Virgin's Son, Jesus. (Roman Catholics devote all of May to Mary.) This suggests that Jesus would choose the "innocent" boys & girls more than anyone else. Actually, no one's innocent & God loves all us rotten sinners just the same.