Tag Archives: Malcolm Guite

Books for the waiting.

Advent, books, poetry, , ,

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!

Women on the very edge of things.

feasts, poetry, women, , ,

We are celebrating the Feast of the Visitation on March 30; this is the commemoration of the visit the Virgin Mary made to her cousin Elizabeth, seemingly soon after the the Annunciation, because the Scripture says she “went with haste.” Elizabeth was also expecting a baby, the Holy Prophet, Forerunner and Baptist John.

Malcolm Guite has written a sonnet for the feast, which you can find in the anthology Sounding the Seasons. In the West the feast is kept in May.

THE VISITATION

Here is a meeting made of hidden joys
Of lightenings cloistered in a narrow place
From quiet hearts the sudden flame of praise
And in the womb the quickening kick of grace.
Two women on the very edge of things
Unnoticed and unknown to men of power
But in their flesh the hidden Spirit sings
And in their lives the buds of blessing flower.
And Mary stands with all we call ‘too young’,
Elizabeth with all called ‘past their prime’
They sing today for all the great unsung
Women who turned eternity to time
Favoured of heaven, outcast on the earth
Prophets who bring the best in us to birth.

-Malcolm Guite

Waking in the middle of January.

my garden, the language, winter, , , , , , , , ,

Today felt like the beginning of a fresh season. The real seasons don’t sync with the dates on the calendar, and right now presents itself as more natural for starting something, for having the necessary energy and expectation. If my helper Alejandro hadn’t come to prune, it might not have happened still. But I did ask him to come, so I guess I got the ball rolling, or the pruners opened, or something.

In the first week of January, I only needed to go to church, to be carried on a wave of feasts and exultations. I did that seven times in seven days, because of St. Basil’s Day, Theophany, and our parish feast day, with all the associated Matins and Vespers services. When I go to church it’s nearly impossible for me to get Anything Done the rest of the day. So of course I was Behind in the second week, and before I had caught up much I sank a bit Under the Weather, and put this painting as the background of my computer monitor:

Felix Vallotton, Femme Couchee Dormant, 1899

But! I didn’t resemble that lady all the time, and when I put her picture up it was at my New Computer I was sitting, the whole project of which was accomplished for me (just before I went Under) by a team of family members, starting with Soldier, who chose and ordered the machine, and the Professor and Scout who got it set up beautifully. Especially Scout, whom some might remember as the boy at left, but who now is a young man and my favorite I.T. guy. My computing (reading and word processing) now goes blessedly like lightning, compared to the old system.

That speed enabled me to switch my Duolingo lessons from my phone to the computer, which was a relief, because all the phone pecking had aggravated my right thumb joint. It is in an effort to learn Greek that I was suffering the abuse, which led one friend to declare that I now have a Greek Thumb. I found the audio-visual lessons to be inadequate without writing practice, so once I switched to the computer I started writing down some phrases and sentences I was learning.

A trip to Greece is in my near future, if all goes as planned — I will surely tell you more about that soon. It’s doubtful that I will use the language much when I go there, but at least I may be able to make out some signage. And languages are always fun. I really need to work on my Greek penmanship, though!

My Greek Thumb had been one more cause of my enervation. But after about a week of lounging about and never quite finishing the dishes and laundry, I found myself out in the garden picking greens and stringing up pea supports. It was an overcast day, but I wore my barn coat and garden gloves and happily pulled out the rotten cherry tomato plant and took pictures of the pomegranates before they got pruned.

Many people have looked out the window at those fruits and wondered what they could be. The pomegranates get bleached by the winter rain and frosts, and don’t resemble at all the deep red fruits they were in the fall.

The day’s harvest of parsley, kale, collards and Swiss chard was fantastic. I hadn’t picked any for a couple of months. That type of kale on the top of this bowlful is so beautiful and hardy, I hope I can find the same seeds to plant again this year.

On the last day of lounging, my podcast listening also helped me get into a more active mode, because my contemplative self had been supremely satisfied by listening to Malcolm Guite. He was talking about George MacDonald, at a celebration last year of MacDonald’s 200th birthday.

The event took place at the Wade Center at Wheaton College, and the recording of it can be found here on YouTube: “When A Heart Is Really Alive: George MacDonald and the Prophetic Imagination.”

If you are at all interested in MacDonald, C.S. Lewis’s conversion, the vision of Coleridge, or myth and the imagination generally, I very heartily recommend it. I’m going to watch/listen again. Guite’s love for God and for his subject(s) are contagious. Immediately following that experience, I had today a perfect Home Alone Day, when my scattered mind wasn’t too challenged by having to multi-task. And that helps me to get more Things Done, which is calming and energizing.

Even though my last couple of days were more about Getting Up than waking up, I put the word “wake” in the title of this post because one theme of Guite’s talk and MacDonald’s writings is Waking Up. You can listen to the podcast and hear more about what we might wake to; I will just leave you with a related thought from the author himself:

“The world…is full of resurrections… Every night that folds us up in darkness is a death; and those of you that have been out early, and have seen the first of the dawn, will know it — the day rises out of the night like a being that has burst its tomb and escaped into life.” -George MacDonald

The dark is bright.

poetry, saints,

Malcolm Guite has given us a sonnet to turn our remembrance to the origin and meaning of Hallowe’en, and to the saints, known and unknown, those “steady lights undimmed” who are commemorated in the next days. If you go to his site, “Malcolm Guite,” you can read a little related history, and hear him reading his own poem. It’s worth a click.

ALL SAINTS

Though Satan breaks our dark glass into shards
Each shard still shines with Christ’s reflected light,
It glances from the eyes, kindles the words
Of all his unknown saints. The dark is bright
With quiet lives and steady lights undimmed,
The witness of the ones we shunned and shamed.
Plain in our sight and far beyond our seeing
He weaves them with us in the web of being
They stand beside us even as we grieve,
The lone and left behind whom no one claimed,
Unnumbered multitudes, he lifts above
The shadow of the gibbet and the grave,
To triumph where all saints are known and named;
The gathered glories of His wounded love.

-Malcolm Guite