Turn to little things.

poetry,

Joseph Bottum shares this poem on Substack today:

A LAMENT

We who are left, how shall we look again
Happily on the sun, or feel the rain,
Without remembering how they who went
Ungrudgingly, and spent
Their all for us, loved, too, the sun and rain?

A bird upon the rain-wet lilac sings —
But we, how shall we turn to little things
And listen to the birds and winds and streams
Made holy by their dreams,
Nor feel the heartbreak in the heart of things?

-Wilfred Wilson Gibson

9 thoughts on “Turn to little things.”

  3. “In Flanders fields the poppies grow, between the crosses row on row.” WWI is over a century ago, but my memory of my great-aunt is still here, she who lost the love of her life in that war and never married. She was a plain girl, quiet and shy, a woman who had no aspiration to work outside the home unlike her sisters. My grandmother had one picture of she and her fiance in his uniform before he left. Uncharacteristic for that time she was sitting on his lap in public, and he was looking on her adoringly. Then the cruel ax of fate descended and she spent the rest of her life taking care of her parents and then moving from one married sister to the next helping them. I think of the contemporary song by Blondie, “War Child”: “You’ve never been stopped by the Khmer Rouge, you hear about the Troubles on the evening news, Palestinian lovers caught out after curfew;” with the woman who sang it commenting that nothing much had changed since the 1980’s when she first sang that song. Lord have mercy on us. Cathy

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    1. There were so many “maiden aunts” because of that war 😦 Elizabeth Goudge wrote about them in her memoir, which was where I first was made to think about the phenomenon. She was a child who benefited a great deal from having them around, and couldn’t imagine life without all the kinds of help, physical and emotional, that they gave.

      Like

      Reply

      1. What you posted about Elizabeth Goudge’s memoir was interesting though I did not have a close relationship to my great-aunt Jean. She was very introverted when I knew her and opened herself up to few, but I have one interesting story about her life (I would have been a baby then) when she had just come to Canada after the parents in Scotland had died. She was living with her sister Jessie who had married “up” to a man from the upper middle class in Britain who transferred that status to a job with British Petroleum in Toronto. They lived in a nice neighborhood in north Toronto, somewhat like the McDonald St. area here. Great-uncle Bert could be a critical and cutting person and had to have everything just so. One day he had made some razor-sharp remarks about things he didn’t like about the breakfast Aunt Jessie served him which reduced her to tears. Aunt Jean emptied a pitcher of milk all over his head and down on his suit he was wearing to work and calmly stated “Tha’ will be enow o’ tha’.” She was put on the afternoon train to her other sister who lived in eastern Ontario near the small city of Cornwall, but eventually it all blew over and she would continue to rotate between those two sisters for the rest of her life. When I eventually heard that story I was very impressed considering her reticent personality, but it gave me an early lesson in not putting up with bullying even with people who seemingly held the upper hand and had great power over your life. Cathy

        Liked by 1 person

  6. I kept my computer off all day on the 11th……and pondered what War is.. and why we have to have it…. and why in the picture of my dad.. before the war.. he is smiling.. sweet , young and soulfilled with joy .. and in the picture after the war.. the sadness in his soul, never to be erased.. the cries in his dreams screaming out…at night I remember as a baby.. then his manic depressive life I understood more as I pondered .. and sighed.. and appreciated him more than ever.. and our uncles.. our Code talkers.. our lives as mothers and children and wives never the same… ever…. … thanking God for His warm love spilling out over us all .. unstoppable God. Thank you , Father… for your overpowering joys in the little things brought forward into the Light. x

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

Leave a comment

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.