Poets
met at Trinity Church, Collinsvillle, on a very cold Saturday (8 below zero
when we left our homes) to consider being Voices of Change. We explored how the culture is changing
around us, how we, the church, are changing with our culture and that we may
need to just recognize, ‘Change is.’
Aldon
Hymes starts us off here with his Lenten discipline of focusing on creating and
appreciating creation. He is
writing a poem a day. The Rev. Jim
Bradley explores the world of the creed and what he believes about God. He presents us with different images
and watch very carefully the portrait he draws of the edges of God, perhaps
those parts of God which touch us.
It’s images of God you may be fruitfully spending time with now. The church is also changing so I spend
some time expressing what might be some of our anger and fear while also
staying with the Old Testament lesson I read in church on Ash Wednesday. It is good to spend time with Isaiah.
Peace,
Barbara A. Campbell, Connecticut’s Diocesan Poet
A Lenten Discipline
by Aldon Hynes
Grace and St.Peter’s Church, Hamden
02/21/2015
This year, I will focus on creating
and
appreciating creation.
It is too easy to be morose,
to think about our frailty and failings,
both individual and collective.
We are reminded of this
on the incessant evening news.
Three young Muslims were killed today.
A tank car carrying crude oil exploded.
The cease fire is not holding.
Congress has reached an impasse.
The soundtrack of human suffering
plays on the car radio
as we commute to and from
the daily grind.
The numbed mind doesn’t see
the beauty of the young deer
foraging for food,
nibbling on branches
in the waist deep snow.
The numbed mind doesn’t see
the high five
the homeless man gives
to his buddy
who just got a job.
I will remember moments in nature
walking home alone
beside the frozen stream
and pausing to look
at the perfect pattern of ice
jutting out from a rock.
I will remember visits to the museum
walking reverently
towards the masterpiece
and standing to soak in
all the beauty someone else
had managed
to mingle with paint
and adhere to a canvas.
I will remember the cathedral moments
of childhood;
transcendence, and wonder,
of something greater than myself
in crowds of people
like me and yet not like me.
I will remember quiet moments
of childhood;
when I was hurt
or failed
and someone said,
“I love you.”
This year, I will focus on creating
and appreciating creation.
CREDO
by The Rev. Jim Bradley
Rector Emeritus
St. John’s Church, Waterbury
I believe in the Edges of God.
Truly, that is my limit on the whole question of Creed.
I don’t believe in a God storming out of the clouds
and smiting me to smithereens if I am bad.
I don’t believe in a God who would wake me up,
pin me to my bed and give me bleeding sores
on my palms and my feet,
much less my side.
(Explain that to your general practitioner!)
I don’t believe in a God who would instruct me
to slay infidels or displace peaceful people
so I can have a Motherland.
I don’t believe in a God who has nothing better to do
beside visit bedrooms around the globe
uncovering (literally) illicit love.
I don’t believe in a God who frets
about who wins the next election.
I don’t believe in a God who believes in ‘abomination’.
I believe in the edges of God—
the soft parts, the tender pieces—
the feathers and the fur of God.
I do believe in the ears of God,
which stick out-cartoon like-on the edges of God’s being.
I, myself, listen and listen
and then listen some more
for the Still, Small voice.
I believe in God’s nose-prominent and distinctively
Jewish in my belief—
I smell trouble from time to time
and imagine God sniffs it out too.
The toenails and fingernails of God—
there’s something I can hold onto,
if only tentatively.
Hair, there’s something to believe in as well.
God’s hair-full, luxurious, without need of gel or conditioner,
filling up the Temple, heaven, the whole universe!
I can believe in God’s hair.
God’s edges shine and blink and reflect color.
God’s edges are like the little brook,
flowing out the woods just beyond the tire swing,
in what used to be my grandmother’s land.
God’s edges are like the voices of old friends,
old lovers, people long gone but not forgotten.
God’s edges are not sharp or angled.
The edges of God are well worn by practice
and prayer and forgotten possibilities
about to be remembered.
God’s edges are like the wrists of someone
you don’t quite recall but can’t ever remove from your heart.
God’s edges are rimmed and circled
with bracelets of paradox and happenstance
and accidents with meaning.
God is edged with sunshine,
rainbows,
over-ripe, fallen apples, crushed beneath your feet
and the bees hovering around them.
God’s edges hold storm clouds too—
the Storms of the Century coming fast,
tsunamis and tornados, spinning out of control.
Blood from God’s hands-now there’s an edge of God
to ponder, reach for, then snatch your hand away.
God bleeding is an astonishing thought.
God bleeding can help my unbelief.
And most, most of all,
the edges of God are God’s tears.
Tears of frustration, longing, loss, deep pain,
profound joy, wonder and astonishment—
tears that heal and relieve and comfort...
and disturb the Cosmos.
That’s what I believe in:
God’s tears.
What did
Isaiah say?
by Barbara A. Campbell
Connecticut’s Diocesan Poet
February 2015
We are an amorphous bunch
in Church
here for scores of reasons:
It’s my duty.
I’ve always come.
My mother made me do it.
It’s tradition.
And then there are fewer of us
in Church.
Soccer got blamed a lot,
and the weather
and maybe it really was the New York Times
or just sleeping in.
But now we need to reconsider
Yes, it’s nice for each of us to have our own pew.
Yes, we can say we know everybody
and know all our quirks and agendas.
but there used to be more of us,
there always was more of us.
What to do?
If I become a more obvious
Christian outside
and wear those ashes,
am I a marked woman?
If we feed and warm the homeless,
I’ll be learning new names
understanding new situations.
What if things need to be done differently?
Who adjusts?
If you are in my church, why am I
adjusting?
How much do I really own this
space?
What am I supposed to be doing
here
in Church?
Why do I come to church?
Did Isaiah really mean:
loosen the bonds of injustice,
share bread with the hungry,
free the oppressed,
house the homeless.
clothe the naked?
Why am I just sitting here in a
nice warm building
listening
praying,
receiving the blessings of Communion
singing
and hanging around for a cup of
coffee?
Let me check Isaiah again.
