THE FALLOW DEER AT THE LONELY HOUSE
One without looks in to-night
…Through the curtain-chink
From the sheet of glistening white,
One without looks in to-night
…As we sit and think
…By the fender-brink.
We do not discern those eyes
…Watching in the snow,
Lit by lamps of rosy dyes
We do not discern those eyes
…Wondering, aglow,
…Fourfooted, tiptoe.
-Thomas Hardy
The last lines of this poem rescue it for me, out of a feeling of chaos and loss. The moon is a real thing, unlike the many insubstantial facts that we might forget. In this case it’s also an experience in the moment, of heartfelt beauty, good for centering the soul.
FORGETFULNESS
The name of the author is the first to go
followed obediently by the title, the plot,
the heartbreaking conclusion, the entire novel
which suddenly becomes one you have never read, never even heard of,
as if, one by one, the memories you used to harbor
decided to retire to the southern hemisphere of the brain,
to a little fishing village where there are no phones.
Long ago you kissed the names of the nine muses goodbye
and watched the quadratic equation pack its bag,
and even now as you memorize the order of the planets,
something else is slipping away, a state flower perhaps,
the address of an uncle, the capital of Paraguay.
Whatever it is you are struggling to remember,
it is not poised on the tip of your tongue
or even lurking in some obscure corner of your spleen.
It has floated away down a dark mythological river
whose name begins with an L as far as you can recall
well on your own way to oblivion where you will join those
who have even forgotten how to swim and how to ride a bicycle.
No wonder you rise in the middle of the night
to look up the date of a famous battle in a book on war.
No wonder the moon in the window seems to have drifted
out of a love poem that you used to know by heart.
-Billy Collins
PERSONAL
Don’t take it personal, they said; but I did, I took it all quite personal —
the breeze and the river and the color of the fields; the price of grapefruit and stamps,
the wet hair of women in the rain — And I cursed what hurt me
and I praised what gave me joy, the most simple-minded of possible responses.
The government reminded me of my father, with its deafness and its laws,
and the weather reminded me of my mom, with her tropical squalls.
Enjoy it while you can, they said of Happiness Think first, they said of Talk
Get over it, they said at the School of Broken Hearts
but I couldn’t and I didn’t and I don’t believe in the clean break;
I believe in the compound fracture served with a sauce of dirty regret,
I believe in saying it all and taking it all back
and saying it again for good measure while the air fills up with I’m-Sorries
like wheeling birds and the trees look seasick in the wind.
Oh life! Can you blame me for making a scene?
You were that yellow caboose, the moon disappearing over a ridge of cloud.
I was the dog, chained in some fool’s backyard; barking and barking:
trying to convince everything else to take it personal too.
-Tony Hoagland
O Key of David and sceptre of the House of Israel;
you open and no one can shut;
you shut and no one can open:
Come and lead the prisoners from the prison house,
those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death.
-Antiphon “O Clavis”
Orthodox Christians keep a 40-day fast before the Feast of the Nativity of Christ, so we get a head start on those whose Advent starts around the first of December. This year one of the books our parish women’s reading group has chosen for this time is Behold a Great Light: A Daily Devotional for the Nativity Fast through Theophany, edited by Lynnette Horner. It contains short meditations from Fr. Basil Ross Aden, Elissa Bjeletich Davis, Fr. Stephen De Young, Fr. Stephen Freeman, Fr. Michael Gillis, Laura S. Jansson, Nicole Roccas, and Brandi Willis Schreiber. These are interspersed with hymns and Scripture readings of the season.
I noticed that in the Audible format, most of the contributors read their own writings, and I know I would like to hear their voices, but I didn’t get the audio version, because in general I need to read in print anything that I want to meditate on, so that I can pause and think as needed.
Also this year I am trying to read a little of Winter Fire every day. It is a collection of Christmas themed writings from G.K. Chesterton, compiled by and commented on by Ryan Whitaker Smith. Last year I read only a tiny bit from it. Day One of the book begins like this:
It was in the season of Christmas that I came out of my little garden in that “field of the beeches” between the Chilterns and the Thames, and began to walk backwards through history to the place from which Christmas came. —The New Jerusalem (1920)
So begins The New Jerusalem, G. K. Chesterton’s travelogue chronicling his journey to the Holy Land. But before the destination, there is the journey. For Chesterton, it begins in a backyard in Beaconsfield, England, as the large, mustached man unlatches the garden gate and sets off on his adventure. Perhaps yours begins in a kitchen, with a strong cup of black coffee, or in a comfortable corner of the living room, the windows limned with frost. For me, it begins in a home office I affectionately call “the library,” as the fields around my house are blanketed with early morning fog. Regardless of our various points of departure, this book is an invitation to link arms and set off together, as we “walk backwards through history to the place from which Christmas came.”
Note that “I am trying” to read every day. Over the years, and I remember as far back as junior high, I have never had the kind of discipline — or the mind? — that it takes to engage with these daily-reading books as they are meant to be used. I can’t imagine Chesterton reading such a book. Typically the meditations that are included by the editors don’t provide the kind of stimulus or reminder that helps me to think or pray better, so it often feels like a waste of time.
You’d think that a book of Chesterton’s writings would solve the problem for me — we shall see! The latter part of the book, after the Advent readings are done, consists of essays, poems, stories, and even recipes. So far my weakened mind is deterred somewhat by the long paragraphs in the essays, which were not a problem for readers a hundred years ago. It would have been helpful if Mr. Smith had taken the liberty to add a few paragraph breaks occasionally. At the same time, I know it will be a good exercise to settle in and force myself to ponder what only amounts to a few pages in one sitting.
One Christmas book that I definitely enjoy is Malcolm Guite’s Waiting on the Word: A poem a day for Advent, Christmas and Epiphany; poems are the easiest form for me, in which to discover the rich meaning of the season that is full of mystery. It was a little miracle that I could find it last month on my mostly unorganized shelves, and now have it handy on my nightstand.
Guite chooses from many poets a selection of poems that give voice to his belief that “…the the advent of Christ has for us a triple focus.” There is the first coming, in the Incarnation of the Word and His birth in Bethlehem, and the Second Coming of Christ in majesty, at the end of time. In between, “there are many other advents.”
“In our encounters with the poor and the stranger, in the mystery of the sacraments, in those unexpected moments of transfiguration surely there is also an advent and Christ comes to us.”
It might well happen that some of His comings to us will be through the pages of our books. In any case, Come, Lord Jesus!
Gladsome Lights 