Our Lady of Pentecost; the Feast of Fire

 A meditation poem for today’s feast; Mary Mother of the Church, Our Lady of Pentecost

The Feast of Fire

They came creeping, nine days hence,

Cowed and craven, so lately elated

then lost once again,

The Shepherd passing beyond the seeing of the flock.

So they shelter now, each one arriving, drawn back to the familiar

To the place before it all went wrong, 

To sanctuary, to cenacle, to supper room

Seeking a communion with Him who seems 

Withdrawn beyond the clouds of grief

Checking the locks as each arrives, 

Twelve enter and fast reseal the doors

Avoiding all eyes lest they remember and accuse

For even though absolved, the remembrance of their weakness 

Burns them still and makes them afraid.

So each takes their shadowed place and falls 

Exhausted into prayer as longing and lament,

For days seeming now lost, for nearness now only yearned for

As their fear and frantic flight comes at last to rest drawn divinely

To this place and more, gently pulled into the orbit 

Of she who is the still centre of the room, of the world, 

Of all that is made, and whose very presence is prayer, 

Is participation in oneness, in mystery, in motherhood.

A green leaf on a long wintered tree, a veiled and hidden spark, 

A dark lantern bright with flame hidden 

From all as yet but on them luminous enough 

To draw them mothlike home again and calm their cowardice 

And grief with remembrance of a promise made, 

Of an advocate, a counsellor, a witness, a teacher, a friend who follows.

So, resting in her graced gaze they sit

Until at last, empty of expectation, they touch the holy quiet 

Where grief becomes grace and the doors of the soul 

At last burst the bolts of pride to creak open and wait, 

Watching as farmers and fisherfolk both gaze upon the sky 

Knowing, feeling in their bones the first stirring of a change

Which comes this day at dawn’s first touch, 

Beginning gentle as Elijah’s breeze,

Hardly noticed but for it’s waking in tired hearts 

And souls the remembrance of gilded childhood memories, 

Of first kisses, favourite foods and strains of soul songs heard 

On the very edge of sleep,

So subtle that they feel only the change of air 

Upon their skin; or is it simply 

The first stirring of hope in hearts who ache for absence?

Now a rustling is heard, around, about, within 

As, despite their shuttered darkness

The gloom appears to lift, and in a predawn glow

They see each others faces for the first time again

Then a wind begins to catch and lift the settled sad dust of days 

Bring with it the sudden bright blessing of recall of Him 

Who called them once, and calls again and will ever call, 

Until they answer as apostles and know in Him their life and love anew.

And looking up they see now sparks, begin to fall as light as feathers from the breast Of some gentle bird who hovers over the chaotic waters 

Of their tears and restores to order their broken hearts 

Now split and open, raw and ready to receive the revelation.

Roaring then the Spirit comes, the crimson dove become a phoenix 

In pyre pinioned flighting gale, 

Now a whirlwind, a hurricane, a breath of power, 

Fiery and flaming descending from on high, 

Surrounding and filling each and all, consuming conflagration,

remaking and renewing they become a burning bush of revelation, 

A flaming brand, a gospelled sword, their once frightened hearts 

And tongues of twelve now forged anew in fire

And in their midst the One who is the holy mountain 

Shines Sinai like and is revealed herself 

As Queen and Spouse of Glory, crowned with living fire, 

The Ark of God made manifest unveiled.

Full of flame they erupt out onto the waking street their fiery eyes and hearts

Sparking understanding in all who hear, for fire knows no boundaries, 

Needs no dialects but speaks the spirit word from burning heart to heart reversing babel’s curse and shines now brightly

Upon this birthday, burnday, blessed new beginning day, 

When humankind beheld the fiery glory of their God at last 

Not upon a distant mountain but now and evermore within the heart, the breath, the flame tipped tongue where the burning Dove now dwells and for those who will surrender all remakes them too to become, 

Always, fire.

Clare: the burning one!

Clare

There came at last
the night when,
with Bishop’s blessing,
she drew back the great bolt
and, with sudden strength
unknown before,
cast open wide
the ancient oaken doors
and left it all behind.
Breathing the cool free
air of night
her sparkling eyes, now
a mirror of the canopy
of shining sisters overhead.
Veiling herself in night,
and without a backward glance,
she fled to the forested friars
who met this already bright one
with their lamps lit at woodland edge.
So theu beckoned her
to the little house of the Mother,
where she once again
affirmed the divinely kindled desire
of her heart’s longing,
and threw herself into the flames of faith,
a furnace so incandescent
that hair, and clothing, and even name,
are burned away.
And so the robe of blessing was bestowed
and the promises that bind the hearts
of those who know
true freedom made.
He was there, of course,
to receive her sacred vows,
as his first sister,
and a daughter of his prophesying too,
Francis of the dancing fire,
whose sparking words first
heard through her window
open to the world below
found a home in the dry
kindling of her heart
and became a raging firestorm
so strong that,
castle walls and binding ties
could not hold her captive any longer,
but allowed her
leap into the arms of love itself
upon that quiet woodland night
and find within that
merry band of brothers
a garden where
her seed soul spark could
grow and bloom unhindered
and unquenched.
What psalms were sung
and candles kindled through that night
within that little portion that the Lady
had allotted them
who served her Son and Lord anew!
What rejoicing did the Angels make
drawing even the animals
to witness this new beginning
as, unseen but felt,
the fiery Dove descended
and warmed with hidden wingbeat
the heat of grace within this gracious one
now sharing in the lot of those whose
only riches are the gifts of holy love.
So Francis looked
upon this little plant
newly sown in sacred fire
and smiling saw within
the power of her poverty,
the fire that would,
in time, spread undimmed
to countless sisters
who would come
hearing of her wild wonders,
she to whom
Kings and Lords
would bow
humbled by the humility
of one who dared to trust,
as he had trust himself,
in heaven’s promise
to uphold all those
who dance across
the rose red coals
of passion
so light,
so empty,
they can not
be burned
but incandesce
themselves
and become
ah!
Fire.

St Clare’s Day 2018

Meditation for St. John's Eve

Meditation for St. John's Eve:

Now, as Vespers sings itself
to dusk’s silent sitting,
the beacons begin to burn.
Men watching for the moment
of Moon’s waning,
in twilight midsummer sky lit
by a Sun too lazy to truly set,
so to kindle flame for the Forerunner;
John.
He whose element is fire.
Both lamps now hanging
in cloth of such deep blue
that the world seems enfolded
in the mantle of one
who midwifed his birth,
even as she joined her magnificat
to old Elizabeth’s pangs,
and doubting Zechariah’s silence,
beneath the shining stars of desert sky.

Now, as Matins touches midnight
of Monks long vigilling,
the herbs are gathered.
Women seeking
the helpers and the healers
in wood, and dell, and garden bed,
where, blessed by dew and moonlight
and the long warmth of Sun’s summer,
the Yarrow and the Bracken,
the Fennel and the Rue,
the Rosemary and the Foxglove,
always the Elder and
the great yellow flower of the Forerunner
willingly give up
their essence on the night
that marks the first whisper
of the Word’s healing breath,
breathed through the one
who is His herald Voice;
John.
Dried, and hung,
and laid upon the Lady Altar
to become more than they are
they will bestow divine healing.
Twice gifted and graced
by Summer’s picking
and Autumn’s
Assumption blessing,
they reveal the medicine
present always, beneath.

Now, as Lauds’ psalms sun skywards
the pots and pans
and ancient drums are beaten.
The children sing the old songs
and the rhymes long lost to meaning,
as young men and women, harelike,
leap heedless across the
dying flames together.
Recalling he who leapt with joy,
filled with fire, even in womb’s waters,
so near was the One who first kindled flame,
rendered the rivers holy and made the wells
vessels of new birth.

Now, as Mass bell tolls dawn’s daily resurrection
monks and men,
and women, and children all
hear the summons of the Sanctifier
and His herald
loud upon morning’s breeze
as embers die down, and herbs are hung up.
Beneath the vaulted stone they gather
to join their voices to praise
that vastness veiled
in simple bread and wine,
and hear again the word first spoken by
the herald,
the lamp,
the flame,
the leaper,
the prophet,
the angel,
the voice,
the Baptist,
whose birth they have
blessed anew,
cry across the ages
“Behold the Lamb of God!”

I wrote this in 2016 to illuminate so many of the customs we have lost that wove the wisdom of the wild and the faith together so beautifully. On St. John's Eve, (The Vigil of the Feast of the Birth of St. John the Baptist), the last official day of the solstice, bonfires were set burning to commemorate the fire of the Baptist's faith and the facing into the waning of natural light after the longest day.
Couples leaping across the fire was an old betrothal custom. This was also the traditional night for gathering the herbs that would be used as medicine for the year to come. Gathered tonight and dried until Assumption Day they would then be blessed in the Monasteries at the first Mass at Our Lady's Altar... The songs and noise making around the boundaries of the hills and the fields was to frighten away evil and stagnancy so as to refresh the fields and prepare for the Harvest... Our faith was and is both holy and holistic and we must return to such deep knowing again... May the Baptist pray for us on this the feast of fire!

O Rising Sun, O Oriens: A meditation on the fifth of the Great O Antiphons of Advent

O Rising Sun!

On the day of the deepest dark

we call you!

Come to us O promised light!

Gazing upon the eastern edge

of the world

we thrill,

as from our long benighted being

the first dayspring spark is cast,

and a red dawn heralds

a conqueror’s coming!

O Rising Sun!

You who are light from light,

scatter upon us

the uncreated light by which our dull eyes

may even now behold

the dawn of your presence!

Illume us as lanterns,

kindle us as fires,

breathe your flame upon us as beacons

in a world so cold

and a winter of the heart so dark

we oft forget the dawn that has come,

is come,

will come again,

needing our annual remembering

to rekindle our rebirth in you

O Son!

O Rising Sun!

We long for your dawn

down the dark and ancient ways of ancestry

Feeling in our old yearning

the gathering of ghostly generations

who followed their deepest knowing,

that map,

long inscribed upon the centre

of our being

but written in a sacred script

unknown to eyes lost to Eden’s light.

For they,

So desperate for the

warming of a presence

they remembered

but did not know

wrought stone,

and marked ways,

and offered song,

and told story,

and gathered green,

and even spent

blood,

to charm back an earthly sun

while truly seeking

for the Divine Son

who would warm

the winter of our heart

and make of Himself

the sacrifice that brings the light back

for an eternal day  

O Rising Sun!

We call you by our evening invocation!

Kindling our vesper candles and vigil lights,

wrapping the wreath of time

in flames of rose and purple,

we sing now the soul song of

the Lady of the Light.

She whose heart blessed beacon

shone so bright in love,

it drew you from

the realms of everlasting day

to that sealed chamber in which,

with quickening touch,

you, the dayspring and the morning star

both

bestowed your spark of glory

and found your home,

issuing forth

as Word and Light

to bestow the blessing

of a dawn from our Midwinter night,

that re-orients us to righteousness,

and reveals the Light beyond all night

Bethlehem born and blazing

as the true and victorious

Son.

"O Rising Sun!

Splendour of light eternal and sun of righteousness:

Come and enlighten those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death!"

Our Lady of the Solstice

Lady of the Solstice

At the moment
of
the
deepest dark
and,
at
the sharp point
of the
longest night,
at such distance from
dawn
that we groan
beneath
the burden of
being,
and touch within
ourselves
only
the winds of winter
and the
wild longing
where
light
is only a memory
long lost
and left behind in
summer sun;
then we,
suddenly,
and just for
the merest of moments,
are hushed
into silence,
as the turning
of the
ancient
wheels of wonder
stop,
and sun and stars
all,
still their divinely
directed dance
and take their
yearly yearned for
deep remembering
rest,
like lovers suddenly
still,
when struck
by desire's reverie;
or dancers,
pulsing with passion,
awaiting the next
beat
of beauty's music
to liberate life within.
They,
our elder siblings
of the sky,
recall in
their
sacred stillness
that moment
when
once,
just once,
their fiery song,
sung since
first
divine kindling,
was
paused,
hushed,
stilled,
stopped;
just
once,
long ago,
so as
to
listen to
a new note
joined to
the
great hymn of gratitude
that all
offer
simply by their very being.
For in that
moment
of their listening
was revealed
she who is
our true solstice.

The Woman,
that moment of
perfect stillness
between
divine in-breathing
and creation's
exhalation of excelsis.
So they watched,
as she who is the
stillpoint
of
the dance of story,
and the sanctuary
where
myth becomes flesh,
then,
before angelic emissary,
dropped the pebble of her
yes,
in its utter simplicity,
longed for through the countless
ages of agony,
into the pool of our pain.

Behold the Solstice of the Lord…
Be it done unto me according to His Word…

Looking deep they
saw its
ripples now run to the
edges of existence
trembling them with
the promise
of a new
Spring.

And the Story became flesh…
And dwelt amongst us…

This young girl,
this Lady of light.
who is our solstice.
She,
the perfect place
of stillness,
so attuned
to the coming of the Light
that in her
all
creation stills,
the old cycle of sin
is broken
and,
even the deep dark
of despair
must yield
to glow of dawn.

She,
the light that glows before
the rising Sun,
heralded by Robin
and Wren
and fluting Blackbird,
She, like that blessed moment
when Sun and Moon
both
hang in the deep blue together
and bow as they pass
gentling our hearts
and
drawing us from dreams
to welcome
the advent of the One
who
IS
Love's Light
and eternal Word both,
spoken now into time’s renewed turning
by the Yes of one who
holds
within her heart
the perfect emptiness of Love.

Treasuring in
the holy dark of
her womb the hearth
where Spring's spark is
kindled
and brightens with beauty
as a
first place of
promised Easter exhalation
the cave of
rebirth;
in which
eternity and time
are married,
and infinity will wed itself
forever
to clay's embrace.

Here, in this
sacred solstice place,
Eve's aching
is healed,
and
here,
Adam's sin
undone,
as from the dry root
of the
sundering tree
a new shoot rises
at the word of
one
whose whole being
is Yes
whose whole being
is
Love,

And so,
yearly
we sit,
rooting ourselves
once again
in Mother Earth's embrace,
and while looking ever upwards
we find the still point
of the skies
and yet
inwardly gaze
into
the light of story
long-kindled
against the cold of winter,
and so become
re-minded,
re-hearted,
re-souled,
by she who is our solstice,
whose self-forgetting
Yes
brought to us
the turning of the light
and blessed us
all
like barren trees
brought to beauty
by a sudden
anointing
of
new snow.

St. Francis of the Elements: a meditation for his feast.

St. Francis of the Elements:

Brother Air:

Francis, 

you were a feather born upon the breath of God; dancing with the unseen and manifesting the invisible in your skyborn steps inviting all to see again the Divine dance into which they are blessed born...

Francis,

you were an Autumnal leaf gilded by grace's sunshine and shower; now unafraid to let go of anything that would keep you from the freedom of flight and happy to journey to the dissolution of all in offering... 

Francis, 

you were a snowflake; unique and Heaven sent, you kissed the earth lightly and woke us to her own beauty and wisdom long lost in our lies...

Francis, 

you were a lightening strike; shattering a clear sky and bringing the Divine storm that renews and creates, bringing beginning and drawing a new Spring from stuffy stalled hearts...

Brother Fire:

Francis,

you were a spark; struck by Grace from the Flint of heart's hardness, yearning for the dry straw of sin to be kindled in kindness consuming...

Francis,

you were a hearth on a Winter's night; leeching the indifference from our cold ecclesial bones, welcoming all to sit in storied circle and be one in warmth...

Francis, 

you were a forest fire; consuming all in the conflagration of your consecrated love, incandescent within the light of Grace flaming through your burning bones...

Sister Water:

Francis,

you were the dew of dawn; appearing to announce a new morning of magic when beasts and birds become brothers and sisters and our tongues are loosed at last in Eden's song...

Francis, 

you were a sweet spring; burbling with joy that knows no end, offering to all a deep draught of the Divine the only answer to soul's thirst...

Francis,

you were a mountain stream; singing your silver song upon a pilgrim path, refreshing worn feet and charming the divine dance from stony hearts...

Francis,

you were an ocean's drop; borne upon the tide of love you yielded to the pull of prayer and lost yourself in the sacred sea of His resurrection gaze and became yourself in unbecoming all you were not...

Sister Mother Earth:

Francis,

you were a grain of dust upon the road; herald and holy, you dwelt in truth's humility, barefoot upon the brown earth fading at distance into the truth of her embrace...

Francis,

you were a stone; becoming stillness you yielded yourself and were chisel formed into a foundation, while still a friar free to rest upon the rock of faith...

Francis,

you were a healing herb; condensing in yourself the medicine of first divine in-breathing when all that is, is named as good, for reminding us of redemption's remedy you gave root and leaf and flower and fruit for all...

Francis,

you were bird and beast; all found their friend in you and revealed their inner teaching of praise at your prayer; wondering to hear in you the voice long lost from creature's canticle sung by all that is, as you drew even tears from those who by Adam's naming had felt their brother-sisterhood of being lost until your call...

Francis,

you are beyond all elemental being now, plunged sainted and seraphic into Love's fire of origin and union and ending, all in one eternal communion of praise, where God is all in all and all are one. Pouring out upon those who are brave enough to follow your bloody footprints upon the Gospeled path an ever flowing fountain of peace and joy and brother beckoning us ever onward, ever upward from earth's embrace, to sing with wind and fire and water our way into the Divine Dance of Being! 

Meditation for St. John's Eve

Meditation for St. John's Eve:

Now, as Vespers sings itself to dusk’s silent sitting.
The beacons begin to burn.
Men watching for the moment
of Moon’s waning
in twilight midsummer sky
of a Sun too lazy to truly set,
to kindle flame for the Forerunner;
John.
He whose element is fire.
Both lamps now hanging in cloth of such deep blue
that the world seems enfolded in the mantle of one
who midwifed his birth,
even as she joined her magnificat
to old Elizabeth’s pangs and doubting Zechariah’s silence
beneath the shining stars of desert sky.

Now, as Matins touches midnight of Monks long vigiling
the herbs are gathered.
Women seeking the helpers and the healers
in wood, and dell, and garden bed
where, blessed by dew and moonlight
and the long warmth of Sun’s summer
the Yarrow and the Bracken,
the Fennel and the Rue,
the Rosemary and the Foxglove and
always the Elder and
the great yellow flower of the Forerunner
willingly give up their essence on the night
that marks the first whisper
of the Word’s healing breath,
breathed through the one who is His herald Voice;
John.
Dried, and hung, and laid upon the Lady Altar
to become more than they are
they will bestow divine healing.
Twice gifted and graced by
Summer’s picking
and Autumn’s
Assumption blessing, they
reveal the medicine present always beneath.

Now, as Lauds’ psalms sun skywards
the pots and pans and ancient drums are beaten.
The children sing the old songs and rhymes
long lost to meaning,
as young men and women harelike
leap heedless across the
dying flames together.
Recalling he who leapt with joy,
filled with fire, even in womb’s waters
so near was the One who first kindled flame
and rendered the rivers holy and made the wells
vessels of new birth.

Now, as Mass bell tolls dawn’s daily resurrection
monks and men, and women, and children all
hear the summons of the Sanctifier and His herald
loud upon morning’s breeze
as embers die down, and herbs are hung up.
Beneath the vaulted stone they gather
to join their voices to praise that vastness veiled
in simple bread and wine,
and hear again the word first spoken by
the herald,
the lamp,
the flame,
the leaper,
the prophet,
the angel,
the voice,
the Baptist
whose birth they have
blessed anew
cry across the ages
“Behold the Lamb of God!”

I wrote this last year to illuminate so many of the customs we have lost that wove the wisdom of the wild and the faith together so beautifully. On St. John's Eve, (The Vigil of the Feast of the Birth of St. John the Baptist), the last official day of the solstice bonfires were set burning to commemorate the fire of the Baptist's faith and the facing into the waning of natural light after the longest day. Couples leaping across the fire was an old betrothal custom. This was also the traditional night for gathering the herbs that would be used as medicine for the year to come. Gathered tonight and dried until Assumption Day they would then be blessed in the Monasteries at the first Mass at Our Lady's Altar... The songs and noise making around the boundaries of the hills and the fields was to frighten away evil and stagnancy so as to refresh the fields and prepare for the Harvest... Our faith was and is both holy and holistic and we must return to such deep knowing again... May the Baptist pray for us!

St. John's Eve: A poetic contemplative reflection

St. John’s Eve

Now, as Vespers sings itself to dusk’s silent sitting.
The beacons begin to burn.
Men watching for the moment
of Moon’s waning
in twilight midsummer sky
of a Sun too lazy to truly set,
to kindle flame for the Forerunner;
John.
He whose element is fire.
Both lamps now hanging in cloth of such deep blue
that the world seems enfolded in the mantle of she
who midwifed his birth,
even as she joined her magnificat
to old Elizabeth’s pangs and doubting Zechariah’s silence
beneath the shining stars of desert sky.

Now, as Matins touches midnight of Monks long vigiling
the herbs are gathered.
Women seeking the helpers and the healers
in wood, and dell, and garden bed
where, blessed by dew and moonlight
and the long warmth of Sun’s summer
the Yarrow and the Bracken,
the Fennel and the Rue,
the Rosemary and the Foxglove and
always the Elder and
the great yellow flower of the Forerunner
willingly give up their essence on the night
that marks the first whisper
of the Word’s healing breath,
breathed through the one who is His healing herald Voice;
John.
Dried, and hung, and laid upon the Lady Altar
to become more than they are
they will bestow divine healing.
Twice gifted and graced by
Summer’s picking
and Autumn’s
Assumption blessing, they
reveal the medicine present always beneath.

Now, as Lauds’ psalms sun skywards
the pots and pans and ancient drums are beaten.
The children sing the old songs and rhymes
long lost to meaning,
as young men and women harelike
leap heedless across the
dying flames together.
Recalling he who leapt with joy,
filled with fire, even in womb’s waters
so near was the One who first kindled flame
and rendered the rivers holy and made the wells
vessels of new birth.

Now, as Mass bell tolls dawn’s daily resurrection
monks and men, and women, and children all
hear the summons of the Sanctifier and His herald
loud upon morning’s breeze
as embers die down, and herbs are hung up.
Beneath the vaulted stone they gather
to join their voices to praise that vastness veiled
in simple bread and wine,
and hear again the word first spoken by
the herald,
the lamp,
the flame,
the leaper,
the prophet,
the angel,
the voice,
the Baptist
whose birth they have
blessed anew
“Behold the Lamb of God!”