Brother Richard, of the Capuchin Franciscans in Italy wrote:
Lockdown
Yes there is fear.
Yes there is isolation.
Yes there is panic buying.
Yes there is sickness.
Yes there is even death.
But,
They say that in Wuhan after so many years of noise
You can hear the birds again.
They say that after just a few weeks of quiet
The sky is no longer thick with fumes
But blue and grey and clear.
They say that in the streets of Assisi
People are singing to each other
across the empty squares,
keeping their windows open
so that those who are alone
may hear the sounds of family around them.
They say that a hotel in the West of Ireland
is offering free meals and delivery to the housebound.
Today a young woman I know
is busy spreading fliers with her number
through the neighbourhood
So that the elders may have someone to call on.
Today Churches, Synagogues, Mosques and Temples
are preparing to welcome
and shelter the homeless, the sick, the weary
All over the world people are slowing down and reflecting
All over the world people are looking at their neighbours in a new way
All over the world people are waking up to a new reality
To how big we really are.
To how little control we really have.
To what really matters.
To Love.
So we pray and we remember that
Yes there is fear.
But there does not have to be hate.
Yes there is isolation.
But there does not have to be loneliness.
Yes there is panic buying.
But there does not have to be meanness.
Yes there is sickness.
But there does not have to be disease of the soul
Yes there is even death.
But there can always be a rebirth of love.
Wake to the choices you make as to how to live now.
Today, breathe.
Listen, behind the factory noises of your panic
The birds are singing again
The sky is clearing,
Spring is coming,
And we are always encompassed by Love.
Open the windows of your soul
And though you may not be able
to touch across the empty square,
Sing.
What beautiful words, and however you are feeling physically, mentally or spiritually at the moment may you know that we are all in this together and best of all, God is with us too.
Our Triangle Community Church 5th Anniversary held on Sunday, November 3rd celebrated FRIENDSHIP and I was reminded of this particular favourite poem of mine, another choice by the beloved contemporary, which I hope you will enjoy too. It feels especially significant as Christmas approaches and we think lovingly of dear friends we perhaps have not seen for some considerable time, as we write our cards.
Reunion By Wendy Cope (1945)
Fifty years have passed since we first met,
And forty seven since we said goodbye,
Embarking on our adult lives- and yet
You are the same, it seems to me. Am I?
Five Decades of life, of ups and downs,
Of love and marriage, work and motherhood,
And here we are, back in the world of gowns
And college food and essays-and its good,
IT’s very good, my lovely, clever friends,
To travel to the past and find you here,
To share just one more evening meal that ends
In someone’s room- before we disappear
Into a future, where I’m sad to know
It’s over. It was over long ago.
Kindly donated by Kathy Denton
An Afternoon by Wendy Cope (1945)
Wendy Cope is a much-loved Cotemporary Poet and this piece is taken from her book entitled "Anecdotal Evidence", published in 2018. She read History at Oxford and worked for fifteen years as a primary teacher in London Schools, prior to becoming a full-time, freelance writer. Her first book of poems: “Making Cocoa for Kingsley Amis”- was published in 1986 and she has received several prestigious awards for her works since then. Her favourite quotation about being an artist, accredited to the composer Schubert is:
"I give the world what I have in my heart and that is the end of it."
Which can be truly said of Wendy Cope’s poetry and poignant expressed in this poem.
The two of them are sitting on the bed
In my small student room. My second year.
My parents are feeling very sad
After a funeral not far from here:
My mother’s closest girlhood friend, who died
Of cancer in her forties. They agree
They can’t face driving home just yet, decide
To come and spend an hour or two with me.
And I, for once, am genuinely pleased
To see them. I’m depressed. I haven’t said.
I hope the hugs and smiles I gave them eased
Their grief. Years later, when they are dead,
I will remember and be moved to say
I never loved them more than on that day.
Poem kindly donated by Kathy Denton.
The Donkey by G.K. Chesterton
When Fishes flew and forests walked
And figs grew upon thorn,
Some moment when the moon was blood
Ten surely, I was born.
And ears like errant wings,
The devil’s walking parody
On all four-footed things.
Of ancient crooked will;
Starve, scourge deride me: I am dumb,
I keep my secret still. Fools! For I also had my hour;
One far fierce Hour and sweet:
There was a shout about my ears,
And palms before my feet.
This poem, originally published in “the Wild Knight” anthology of 1900 , is wholly appropriate for Eastertide, linking as it does , with our “Palm Sunday Bible reading- the triumphal “Ride into Jerusalem."
As a point of interest, the writer is the creator of the famous Priest /Sleuth character ‘Father Brown’ featuring on TV currently. He was exceptionally prolific, embracing an extensive range of subjects amongst which he produced many religious essays.
Kindly donated by Kathy Denton.
An extract from John Keats' epic 19th century poem "Endymion."
A Thing Of Beauty
A thing of beauty is a joy for ever:
its loveliness increases; it will never
Pass into nothingness; but still will keep
A bower quiet for us, and a sleep.
Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.
Therefore, on every morrow, are we wreathing
A flowery band to bind us to the earth,
Spite of despondence, of the inhuman dearth
Of noble natures, of the gloomy days,
Of all the unhealthy and o’er-darkened ways
Made for our searching: yes, in spite of all,
Some shape of beauty moves away the pall
From our dark spirits. Such the sun, the, the moon,
Trees old and young, sprouting a shady boon
For simple sheep; and such are daffodils
With the green world they live in; and clear rills
That for themselves a cooling covert make
’Gainst the hot season; the mid-forest brake
Rich with a sprinkling of fair musk-rose blooms:
And such too is the grandeur of the dooms
We have imagined for the mighty dead;
All lovely tales that we have heard or read:
An endless fountain of immortal drink,
Pouring unto us from the heaven’s brink.
Possibly the most famous of the poems of Robert Frost, an early 20th. century American poet, whose work was initially published in England before publication in America and was in receipt of four Pulitzer Prizes.
The Road Not Taken
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveller, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, i kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if i should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and l
i took the one less travelled by,
And that has made all the difference.
Kindly provided by Kathy Denton
