CURRENT MOON

Saturday, February 02, 2008

Third Annual Brigid in Cyperspace Poetry Slam


This is one of my all-time favorite poems. I've changed "God" to "Goddess" and "Holy Ghost" to "Sophia" and used it to call East a number of times.

Hopkins' description of the Earth, upon which "Generations have trod, have trod, have trod; And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil; And wears man's smudge and shares man's smell: the soil Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod," evokes the way things look in February when our feet, being shod, don't get to feel the Earth. But, he assures us that: "There lives the dearest freshness deep down things; And though the last lights off the black West went , Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs-- Because the Holy Ghost over the bent World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings!" Spring is coming. Look to the East.



"God's Grandeur" (1877)

The world is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;
And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;
And wears man's smudge and shares man's smell: the soil
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.
And for all this, nature is never spent;
There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
And though the last lights off the black West went
Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs--
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Hecate, I think you had left by this time. Echidne posted this for Shaw Kenawe, whose name I can barely write without weeping for her beloved niece. Anyway, E said that her mother had sent this to her once during a rough spell. She doesn't think it's ever been translated. Hope the formatting works...--xan:

Don't fear life.
Don't fear life.
Let it enter your house
Or meet it on the road if you
are homeless.
Do not hide from life in graveyards.
The gate of death is always ajar.

Fly as birds do
Don't take the ruins of the past
for this living moment.
Let the dead bury the dead
Let you greet the living future.
Stay free, without chains, as the wind
The gates of death are always open.

Never say: This is mine forever
Get drunk from the bowl of life
but give it up as freely.
The riches of the world are yours
when you don't demand them.
Live fearlessly, playing the one card.
The door of death is always open.

--Kaarlo Sarkia