What was he like? Brother Leo
remembers Brother Francis.
“What was
he like?”
I asked,
exhausted from
my climb to pierce the
cold cliff top cloister
of
this cowled
brother’s retreat,
hoping to stir
to remembrance his soul
stung by
the Seraph’s fire so long ago,
yet burning
still in eyes ancient but clear,
that gazed
upon my lack of grace with mercy,
and smiled
at me from a distance I cannot fathom
“What was
he like?” he whispered to himself
holding my
question as carefully as the jug
with which
he poured me water, cave cold and clear
to quench a
pilgrim’s thirst.
Then on
that hill above Assisi
the old
hermit friar spoke,
slowly at
first, and stumbling,
as though
his tongue, long lost in silence
of cave and
forest, had now to stretch itself
and awaken
language once spoken,
like one
who comes home from a foreign shore
and finds
the accents of his own confusing.
So we sat
before his cave he and I,
friar and
novice,
lost in
legends and lore,
all the
more beautiful for being
at the same
time,
truth;
and needing
to be told once more
to a world
longing for his possibility to be made present
in edenic
blessing
once again.
What was he
like?
Like a Tree
he was,
that on Summer
days shines green
and in its
topmost branches feels,
the waft of
Heaven’s winds
and dances even
at the stillest hour,
or that in
Autumn clings not to leaf but
changes loss
to gift by
casting
clothes windwards and
delights in
lightness,
its bare
bones describing sky
and
pointing arrowlike
always
upwards.
What was he
like?
Like a Stone
he was,
smoothed by
the sweet rain,
graced by
countless hours of chiselling prayer
into a
solidity of stillness.
A
cornerstone, a keystone, a foundation stone
able to
hold the weight of wisdom lightly,
yet bear up
the broken and bridge the gap;
a stepping
stone to wholeness and home
for those
long lost.
What was he
like?
Like the
Night Sky he was,
open, and
sheltering, and many
couloured
in magnificence, but
starlit in
simplicity.
Its beauty
simply a gradation of light,
infinite in
scope and eternal in origin.
What was he
like?
Like Fire
he was,
tracing his
storied path from spark to ember,
even in
stillness, a banked flame
and always
energy of exultation breathing blessed,
a
conflagration of communion,
buried just
beneath the ashes of abstinence.
What was he
like?
Like a Stag
he was,
who knows
where the sweet water flows,
and travels
the deep dark valleys
and
mountain crags to reach his slaking spirit stream.
Loud as a
Bear he was,
and as
quiet too,
spending
his winters between
wakefulness
and sleep,
lost in the
cave of the heart,
barely
breathing
but
murmuring
mercy for all,
until
Spirit spring stirs and his
honeyed
roar was heard again
upon the
hills.
Like a Wolf
he was,
singing
soul songs beneath sister Moon’s gaze
with clear
eyes lost in Heaven’s love,
calling to
himself his pack, those
who knew
their song and soul sound
in his
echoes of emptiness.
Badger
brawny and
filled with
faith’s wisdom he was,
and likened
to old Broc,
he knew the
ancient ways and
night
walked, as they do,
secret
silent paths,
long
trodden, but needing
refinding
always, in each
generation’s
journey.
Like a
Salmon leaping he was,
glittering
like glass
light
sparkling from sliver scales,
struck by
sunlight, suspended
between sky
and stream in a
moment of
stillness
over ever rushing
river.
What was he
like?
A living
song spark wrapped in the
nest of
Mother earth,
enfolded in
the dun dust brown of the Sparrow,
small and
thin he was,
with a
barefooted skipping gait
barely
holding the joy that burst from his breast
his
feathered soul never far from song.
Like a Wren
in a thornbush he was,
cocking its
eye wryly at the earth bound,
certain of
its power of flight
and yet
choosing our company.
Like a Robin
he was,
who, tree
hidden from view,
sings its
piercing song of Heaven
drawing
down remembrances of innocence past
into hearts
sure they were
long past
childhood’s delight in sheer being,
and there waking
wonder once again.
Thin like a
Thrush he was,
who seeks
the highest branch
even in
storm, and sway-sings with delight a tone made purer
for the
assault of wind, and rain,
and thunder
crackling all around it.
Like a Hawk
he was,
staring
with unblinking eye into Love’s light
and falling
like a stone from heaven
to shock
his sleeping prey awake.
And now?
What is he
like now?
Like a Lark
he is,
free and
flying heaven high
whose
sun-kissed song
seeks only
an open soul and then,
beckons all
skywards.
And I miss
him, though
he sings
his lark song in my heart too,
Aye, and in
yours as well or you
wouldn’t
have visited me here
now would
you?
But I shall
fly to him soon
and there
we will sing together
once again
our lark lauds for the One
who gathers
all bird, and beast, and brother, in blessing.
And then we
sat, old and young together
Cowled in
brown both, though centuries between
and ghosts
to each other,
until the
sun set and the moon rose
waiting for
the Nightingale to chant her compline call
and Assisi bells to ring
their song of peace.
