National Poetry Month

I just saw yesterday that April is National Poetry Month. I wouldn’t consider myself a big connoisseur of poetry. There is much I don’t know about poetry and much poetry I haven’t read or studied. I do like it. Some of it, anyway. As I said once before, in kind of my history with poetry, “When carefully chosen words really encapsulate a particular thought or feeling or truth in poetry, it just really hits home like nothing else.”

Here are just a couple of quotes about poetry:

A man should hear a little music, read a little poetry, and see a fine picture every day of his life, in order that worldly cares may not obliterate the sense of the beautiful which God has implanted in the human soul. ~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

This was a quote tugging at me after reading Janet’s quote from Darwin about not being able to enjoy poetry any more after neglecting it for so long.

This one was quoted in Challies’ mention of a quote from Alister McGrath’s biography of C.S. Lewis (C. S. Lewis – A Life: Eccentric Genius, Reluctant Prophet).

For Lewis, poetry works not by directing attention to the poet, but to what the poet sees: “The poet is not a man who asks me to look at him; he is a man who says ‘look at that’ and points.” The poet is not a “spectacle” to be viewed, but a “set of spectacles” through which things are to be seen. The poet is someone who enables us to see things in a different way, who points out things we otherwise might not notice. Or again, the poet is not someone who is to be looked at, but someone who is to be looked through.

A few years ago I listed some of my favorite poems here and here. and shared some here over the years. I tried my feeble hand at a few of my own: Ode to Hay Fever, Ode to a Summer Cold, and A Mother’s Nightly Ritual.

I think I’m going to make it my ambition for the rest of this month to read a poem a day. Here is one I just discovered:

Notes on the Art of Poetry

By Dylan Thomas

I could never have dreamt that there were such goings-on
in the world between the covers of books,
such sandstorms and ice blasts of words,,,
such staggering peace, such enormous laughter,
such and so many blinding bright lights,, ,
splashing all over the pages
in a million bits and pieces
all of which were words, words, words,
and each of which were alive forever
in its own delight and glory and oddity and light.

I’m linking up for Poetry Friday at hosted at Live Your Poem today.

Read Full Post »

“Jehovah Findeth None”

What Though th’ Accuser Roar

What though th’ accuser roar,
Of ills that I have done;
I know them well, and thousands more;
Jehovah findeth none.

Sin, Satan, Death, press near,
To harass and to appall;
Let but my risen Lord appear,
Backward they go and fall.

Before, behind, around,
They set their fierce array,
To fight and force me from my ground
Along Immanuel’s way.

I meet them face to face,
Through Jesus’ conquest blest;
March in the triumph of His grace,
Right onward to my rest.

There, in His book I bear
A more than conq’ror’s name,
A soldier, son, and fellow-heir,
Who fought and overcame.

His be the Victor’s name
Who fought our fight alone;
Triumphant saints no honor claim,
Their conquest was His own.

By weakness and defeat
He won the meed and crown
Trod all our foes beneath His feet,
By being trodden down.

He hell in hell laid low;
Made sin, he sin o’erthrew;
Bowed to the grave, destroyed it so,
And death, by dying, slew.

Bless, bless the Conq’ror slain!
Slain in His victory!
Who lived, who died, who lives again,
For thee, His Church, for Thee!

~ Samuel Whitelock Gandy

Read Full Post »

Shadow and Coolness

It’s supposed to get up into the 100s today. I am so glad for air conditioning! But the forecasted high temperatures reminded me of this poem. Amy Carmichael was a missionary in India for most of her adult life. The inspiration for this poem came as a result of the heat in India and the refreshing coolness to be found in the shadow, plus the story of the Israelites being led by the pillow of fire by night and the pillar of cloud by day in the book of Exodus.

I Follow Thee

Shadow and coolness, Lord,
Art Thou to me;
Cloud of my soul, lead on,
I follow Thee.
What though the hot winds blow,
Fierce heat beats up below?
Fountains of water flow –
Praise, praise to Thee.

Clearness and glory, Lord,
Art Thou to me;
Light of my soul, lead on,
I follow Thee.
All through the moonless night,
Making its darkness bright,
Thou art my heavenly Light –
Praise, praise to Thee.

Shadow and shine art Thou,
Dear Lord, to me;
Pillar of cloud and fire,
I follow Thee.
What though the way be long,
In Thee my heart is strong,
Thou art my joy, my song –
Praise, praise to Thee.

Read Full Post »

Happy Birthday, Robert Burns

I saw on Facebook that today was Robert Burns‘ birthday. Two of my ten favorite poems are his.

Scotland’s most well-known poet, Burns is a mixture of qualities. He had a pretty horrid personal life. He wrote rowdy drinking songs. I’d probably disagree with many of his views.

But he did have a tender, thoughtful heart and a unique way of expressing sentiment. One of my favorites of his poems is “To a Mouse,” where he laments accidentally upsetting the mouse’s home (the famous line, “The best laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men, Gang aft agley,” or “oft awry” come from this poem). “A Red, Red Rose” is one of the most romantic poems/songs ever. “O Wert Thou in the Cauld Blast” speaks of sheltering someone else. “To a Louse” takes the irony of seeing one on a fine lady’s bonnet at church and makes the parallel, “O wad some Power the giftie gie us To see oursels as ithers see us.”

And somewhere along the way he been at least exposed to a godly family. In The Cotter’s Saturday Night he contrasts their simple faith and integrity with that of hypocritical religion, as shown in this excerpt:

Then, kneeling down to Heaven’s Eternal King,
The saint, the father, and the husband prays:
Hope “springs exulting on triumphant wing,”
That thus they all shall meet in future days,
There, ever bask in uncreated rays,
No more to sigh, or shed the bitter tear,
Together hymning their Creator’s praise,
In such society, yet still more dear;
While circling Time moves round in an eternal sphere

Compar’d with this, how poor Religion’s pride,
In all the pomp of method, and of art;
When men display to congregations wide
Devotion’s ev’ry grace, except the heart!
The Power, incens’d, the pageant will desert,
The pompous strain, the sacerdotal stole;
But haply, in some cottage far apart,
May hear, well-pleas’d, the language of the soul;
And in His Book of Life the inmates poor enroll.

I did read in some forgotten source a brother’s quote that he did not know what family Robert had in mind in this poem, but it certainly wasn’t theirs.

His great talent doesn’t excuse his sins. But sometimes we need to be reminded that a person is more than his sins: there’s more to a drunk than just his drunkenness or to a philanderer than his licentious ways. There’s a soul in there that Christ died for and wants to redeem. I don’t know how much Robert knew of the gospel and whether he believed it for himself: sadly, there is little evidence that he did. But for the people we encounter in these days, we can avoid writing them off for the negative we see and seek God’s wisdom to reach the inner person.

In celebration of Burns’ birthday, here is a reading of “To a Mouse” in the Scottish dialect. There is a more anglicized (and therefore more understandable to us) version here. A neat verse-by-verse analysis of the poem is here.

And here is Red, Red Rose set to music in a lovely arrangement by the King’s Singers:

Read Full Post »

I may not feel Him standing near

I had the last stanza of this in my files but failed to note how I came across it. In Googling a line of it, I found it came from a hymn titled, “Surrounded By Unnumbered Foes.” I have never heard it sung, but I thought it was good, especially the last stanza.

Surrounded by unnumbered foes,
Against my soul the battle goes;
Yet though weary, sore distressed,
I know that I shall reach my rest:
I lift my tearful eyes above—
His banner over me is love.

Its sword my spirit will not yield,
Though flesh may faint upon the field;
He waves before my fading sight
The branch of palm, the crown of light:
I lift my brightening eyes above—
His banner over me is love.

My cloud of battle-dust may dim,
His veil of splendour curtain Him;
And, in the midnight of my fear,
I may not feel Him standing near:
But as I lift mine eyes above,
His banner over me is love.

– Gerald Massey, 1863

Read Full Post »

Dear Lord and Father of Mankind

Dear Lord and Father of mankind,
Forgive our foolish ways;
Reclothe us in our rightful mind,
In purer lives Thy service find,
In deeper reverence, praise.

Drop Thy still dews of quietness,
Till all our strivings cease;
Take from our souls the strain and stress,
And let our ordered lives confess
The beauty of Thy peace.

Breathe through the heats of our desire
Thy coolness and Thy balm;
Let sense be dumb, let flesh retire;
Speak through the earthquake, wind, and fire,
O still, small voice of calm.

~ John Greenleaf Whittier

Longer text is here.

Read Full Post »

The King of Love

I’ve posted this before, but it is on my mind again today. One of my favorites:

The King of love my Shepherd is,
Whose goodness faileth never,
I nothing lack if I am His
And He is mine forever.

Where streams of living water flow
My ransomed soul He leadeth,
And where the verdant pastures grow,
With food celestial feedeth.

Perverse and foolish oft I strayed,
But yet in love He sought me,
And on His shoulder gently laid,
And home, rejoicing, brought me.

In death’s dark vale I fear no ill
With Thee, dear Lord, beside me;
Thy rod and staff my comfort still,
Thy cross before to guide me.

Thou spread’st a table in my sight;
Thy unction grace bestoweth;
And O what transport of delight
From Thy pure chalice floweth!

And so through all the length of days
Thy goodness faileth never;
Good Shepherd, may I sing Thy praise
Within Thy house forever.

~ Henry W. Baker

Read Full Post »

Book Review: The Misery of Job and the Mercy of God

In Beyond Suffering: Discovering the Message of Job (linked to my review) author Layton Talbert referred a few times to a set of poems John Piper wrote called The Misery of Job and the Mercy of God. The poems are in book form there with some beautiful photography and a CD of John Piper reading the poems (at least, the used copy I bought from Amazon had a CD with it). The text and audio are also online here (although a few lines are missing from the text).

There is something about poetry that can express truth with beauty and poignancy, and Piper’s poems certainly accomplish that. They don’t cover every verse or every point made in the book of Job, and they include some scenes not in Job (a conversation between Job and God before Job’s calamities struck and between Job and his wife, who is treated much more tenderly here than in most sermons where I’ve heard her mentioned) which is just an imaginative way of telling the story and expressing what kinds of conversations may have passed. All in all they’re a faithful retelling.

I had wondered why Piper said early on, “And Job would lift his hands to God and wondered why he spared the rod of suffering” until I realized he was probably referring to what Job feared in 3:25 when he said, ““the thing which I greatly feared is come upon me, and that which I was afraid of is come unto me.” We’re going through Job in our church, and just recently discussed what it was that Job might have feared, and it could quite possibly be something along these lines, that God had blessed him so much that he feared that suffering of some kind was going to befall him at some point before it was all over.

There are some really beautiful sections. Here are a few of my favorites (p. 18):

Now tell me, with your heart,
Would you be willing, Job, to part
With all your children, if in my
Deep counsel I should judge that by
Such severing more good would be,
And you would know far more of me?”

What parent could answer that question? Yet we’re called to yield our children to God: they’re ultimately His.

On pages 32-33, shortly after all his trials came:

O God, I cling
With feeble fingers to the ledge
Of your great grace, yet feel the wedge
Of this calamity struck hard
Between my chest and this deep-scarred
And granite precipice of love.

Part of his response to his wife (p. 41):

O Dinah, do not speak like those
Who cannot see, because they close
Their eyes, and say there is no God,
Or fault him when he plies the rod.
It is no sin to say, my love,
That bliss and pain come from above.
And if we do not understand
Some dreadful stroke from his left hand,
Then we must wait and trust and see.

Part of Job’s response to his friends’ accusations (p. 58):

O that some door
Were opened to the court of God,
And I might make my case unflawed
Before the Judge of all the world,
And prove this storm has not been hurled
Against me or my children there
Because of hidden crimes. O spare
Me now, my friends, your packages
Of God, your simple adages.

And I think my favorite lines of all (p. 72):

Beware, Jemimah, God is kind,
In ways that will not fit your mind.

This book took me just under half an hour to read, and then I listened to it the next day in about the same amount of time while mostly following along reading the words. It was quite an enjoyable and beneficial hour, helping to feel some of what Job might have felt. I think I’ll be returning to this volume again and again.

(This review will also be linked to Semicolon‘s Saturday Review of Books.)

Read Full Post »

Flashback Friday: Poetry

Mocha With Linda hosts a weekly meme called Flashback Friday. She’ll post a question every Thursday, and then Friday we can link our answers up on her site. You can visit her site for more Flashbacks.

In honor of National Poetry Month, the prompt for today is:

What poems do you remember from your childhood? Did you have to memorize many poems for school when you were growing up? Did you learn any just for fun? Do you remember which ones they were–and can you still recite them? Did you have a poetry book that you liked to read? Do you enjoy poetry today? Do you prefer rhyming poetry or free verse? Whimsical poetry or epic poems that tell a story? Do you have a favorite poem or poet? Have you ever written any poems?

I must have been exposed to nursery rhymes early on, but my first conscience memory of poetry is from A Child’s Garden of Verses by Robert Louis Stevenson in first grade. Loved that book! My next memory concerning poetry involved making a poetry book a few years later. We were supposed to look up various poems, copy down our favorites, and illustrate them. I wish I still had that book! The only lines I remember from it are from one poem which said, “But I think mice/Are rather nice.” I do not think so now!!

I know I probably read more poetry in English classes through the years, but my next memory is of angst-filled poetry I both read and wrote as a teenager. I’ve written only a few in recent years, two silly and one serious: Ode to Hay Fever, Ode to a Summer Cold, and A Mother’s Nightly Ritual.

I do enjoy poetry today. Good poetry, anyway. When carefully chosen words really encapsulate a particular thought or feeling or truth in poetry, it just really hits home like nothing else.

In general I like rhyming poetry better than free verse — there is just something about the rhythm and disciple of rhyme that is beautiful. Free verse looks like it would be easier, but just stringing words down a page does not constitute a free verse poem, so in a way I think it might be harder to create something truly poetic as a free verse. But it can be done.

I like the idea of epic poems that tell an over-arching story — The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, etc. — but I think today’s readers would find it hard to sustain the thread of the story through that many verses. I enjoy “light verse” like Richard Armour‘s as well as devotional poetry like Amy Carmichael‘s.

I don’t know if I have a favorite poet, but the closest would probably be Robert Frost. Though his poems are mostly pretty short, he packs a lot of meaning in a few words that are accessible to most people today.

Some of my favorite poems of all time are:

Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening by Robert Frost
The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost
How Do I Love Thee by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
To A Waterfowl by William Cullen Bryant
To a Mouse by Robert Burns
To a Louse by Robert Burns
A Red, Red Rose by Robert Burns
The Cotter’s Saturday Night by Robert Burns
The Raven by Edgar Allen Poe
Annabelle Lee by Edgar Allen Poe
To My Dear and Loving Husband by Anne Bradstreet.
September by John Updike
Am I a Stone and Not a Sheep? by Christina Rosetti
The Blue Bowl by Blanche Bane Kuder
The Blue Robe by Wendell Berry
October’s Party by George Cooper
I Am Not Skilled to Understand by Dorothy Greenwell

Do you have a favorite poem?

Read Full Post »

Laudable Linkage and Grandma’s Connected

Just a few interesting things seen round the Web this week, then I have a fun poem I want to share with you.

Lisa shares 7 reasons why I still go to church. I have been thinking of writing a post about reasons to go to church, but this definitely hits the major ones.

Lisa also pointed me to this video of How (Not) to Invite Your Coworker to Church.

I have a sweater I love which is disintegrating in key places. I’ve been trying to figure out something to do to preserve and use it, and this purse made from a sweater might be just the thing.

This cupcake wrapper template to use with scrapbooking paper would be great theme parties or special occasions.

I’m not sure who the author of this poem is — I received it from the Good Clean Funnies List. I’m not a Grandma yet, and I hope to be a cookie-baking, book-reading Grandma, but I will definitely be a “connected” one, too! I’ve mused over at my mother-in-law’s assisted living place how those rooms might look when the connected generation gets into them.

Grandma’s Connected

In the not too distant past–
I remember very well–
Grandmas tended to their knitting
And their cookies were just swell.

They were always at the ready
When you needed some advice
And their sewing (I can tell you)
Was available–and nice.

Well Grandma’s not deserted you,
She dearly loves you still,
You just won’t find her cooking
But she’s right there at the till.

She thinks about you daily
You haven’t been forsook.
Your photos are quite handy
In her Pentium notebook.

She scans your artwork now, though,
And combines it with cool sounds
To make electronic greetings;
She prints pictures by the pounds.

She’s right there when you need her
You really aren’t alone.
She’s out now with her “puter” pals
But she took her new cell phone.

You can also leave a message
On her answering machine
Or page her at the fun meet
She’s been there since nine-fifteen.

Yes, the world’s a very different place,
There is no doubt of that,
So “E” her from her web page,
Or join her in a chat.

She’s joined the electronic age
And it really seems to suit her,
So don’t expect the same old gal,
’cause Grandma’s gone “Computer.”

Read Full Post »