From a Woman's Life

Mary drew water from the well

Luky;
Here is another poem researched from Sr. Maura SSND

FROM A WOMAN'S LIFE
What Mary knew was just
enough for the usual day:
pull water, flint fire, bake
bread, smile, pray

The dark orations, sleep, wake,
wait. When pain honed a nerve
when birth or dying clotted
an hour, she leaned to the curve

of living, resilient to fear,
laughter, suffering.
Partings are a little death,
Each one's journey is a thing

wholly without precedent.
She looked at the sky
for compass. None. She, too,
created a road to travel by.

Catherine Nicolette
Here is another beautiful poem from Sr. Maura. Any girl or woman can relate to this poem. Often, we need to do the daily chores which keep each family going, as do single fathers. We all have used water, heat for cooking, made food and cleaned. My mother researched and loved this poem precisely because she, as daughter, wife and mother, had experienced all that Maura so ably expresses in her reflection on Mary's life.

The lot of  woman is to care; love and bear life at personal risk. We also experience partings from those we love - notably from children when we are parents, and from our loved ones when they need to move on, and our husbands when they leave us widows. No easy thing. Maura rightly calls each parting a little death. Anyone who has undergone a parting knows the painful truth of those words.

Women who give birth experience pain. The gift of life to our planet does not come easily, and yet each life can be a gift that changes the world as we know it. And the gift of Jesus Christ - the gift of Mary to our world - has been the joy and inspiration of the great and honourable Jewish prophets down the ages as they spoke of the impending coming of the Messiah. Mary's gift of her Son to us has been our joy and inspiration too, down the centuries and today.

Underneath the simple patina of the words Maura used to paint her poem-picture, runs a deep river of feeling. She contrasts darkness of oration with the light of the day in which Mary went to the well, struck and built fire, and made food for her loved ones. Mary looked at the sky (symbolising God) for compass, for an answer as  to how she was to lead her life and bring up her Son Who was God made human. What a daunting task she and Joseph faced, which encompassed all their human creativity. Jesus as God was made human, with the Divine Link to the Father. Yet He was a fully human boy in a human body and mind which needed to grow to accept His Call as Messiah to us all. There was no book written with instructions how to train and discipline and care for such a Child. Yet Joseph and Mary did it, and how well they accomplished the task.

Maura, with her reflective understanding born of much prayer and spiritual meditation in her dedicated life understood this. And she simply declared that Mary received no instructions as to how to proceed in her life. Mary thus had to create her own road, as we each do. Each of us, declares Maura in the poem, has a completely unique life  journey without precedent.

Maura turned to Mary and her life for inspiration how to create her own road of life. The dedication, loving nature and realism of Mary as she made her own way of life can be an inspiration to each of us, too, as we daily and nightly move on with the task of developing our lives and personalities on the road we travel.

The question implicity underlying Maura's poem for me would be; are we creating a road to travel by that will inspire others to travel along the same kind of road? Are we, indeed, true to ourselves as Mary was...

*Poem 'FROM A WOMAN'S LIFE' by Sr. Maura SSND
 Sign. May 1982, Used with permission
*Photograph was taken by Rev. Catherine in beautiful India