Wednesday, August 16, 2017

MARY SINGS


MARY SINGS

My spirit sings
at the sheer memory of a drift of wings
across my chamber floor, the night wind crying
over still Nazareth, complacent lying
in arms of March, down where the small street turned
and one wan candle burned.

My heart will break
until I tell in song this poignant ache
of after-music, soft as moon-fall blending
with peace along the lakes of years unending,
sweet as the peal of Beauty's vesper-bell,
O give me leave to tell!

Since I had known
the burning hunger of the rose full blown ...
robins and larks, and little feet that pattered
past my low window - sounds the light breeze scattered
caught at my heart to find its lilies thrill - 
a wistful woman's still.

Then came a day
of which I sing in simple woman's way,
knowing nor lustrous note nor word can capture 
or loose the leashes of that midnight rapture;
white as the broken bread of promise, this -
the Spirit's ineffable kiss!

O piteous plight
of Joseph dreaming lonely in the night
who did not hear a rush of white wings whirring
through the soft dark, nor the swift music stirring
in my wild heart brimmed with a surging grace,
dreaming a little face.

My woman's art
wove at a living loom beneath my heart,
where through my body's maiden weft was twining
deific, golden warp in patterns shining,
on Love's swift shuttle to life's fabric spun -
God's infinite, deathless Son.

O you who sing,
who break your hearts against the joy of spring,
straining your lutes to catch life's living laughter,
know that the lonely loves you follow after
lie cradled in my young arms' fragile quest -
Et incarnatus est!*

Sister M Thérèse
Give Joan a Sword. MacMillan. 1945
Used with permission

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* And (the Word) was made flesh

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