soundofmanywaters

  I consider, I consider Two eyes staring in the mirror The seer veiled in the sight. Dark suns in a blue corona Show only riddles of their owner. I lift my eyes to the light. Father of light, now let me raise My sight to meet Your radiant gaze. What You behold me to be Is who I am – beyond surmise Is Love in the Beholder’s eyes Whose seeing me makes me see.

It seemed we were cornered, a cosmic conspiracy, Our life and our longing aligned against us With the dread of death, our desire for justice And the friend who forgives, forgives all Though understanding everything, each other’s tearing, Our mood and our might mocked by our ending. “We did not beg birth, bawling at heaven, Nor the debt we bear, desire buying Fractured fulfilment, and at last futility. We are numb in our need, knowing it unmet And to ache forever. Oh that you had made us As the unperceiving stones, unfeeling sea, The semblance in the stars of freezing serenity.” Thus we acted the innocent.     Until the ringleader (As we dared say) defected to our side, Assumed mortality like man that is made. He sustained the weary, stole the sting From grief’s wounds with a gentle word. Peace and healing were his practice, Rage too at wrong that wrecks us. Vain then and unvalued was our show of virtue, Our Babel laid bare to his brightness. Wan then the welcome to light ...

One of the beautiful things about being a Christian is that, God having amazingly made reconciliation with us through Jesus, we find ourselves loved and forgiven. This marks the beginning of a long journey of reconciliation: because the healing of our relationship with God has taken place at a very deep and still being-worked-through level, our relationships with the world, with others and with ourselves is now also open to receiving God's healing. Even the parts of our being of which we have no conscious awareness are open to the vast mindfulness of the One in whom we live and move and have our being. So here is an attempt to imagine an encounter with my inner stranger, deep in the jungle of the subconscious... Call of the wild So if the wild is out there, Who is this yelling in here? Are you an anthropoid ancestor, Born to rampage round The forest of my mind? Or did you retreat deep into the darkness from The closed faces and cutting words? Was it horror beyond hideous That hound...

 Prayer from the first, a new born baby’s cry And in the dying soul’s departing sigh. Defibrillation, jolting us to start The blood now beating through a broken heart. Prayer in the desert blooming all alone A rose whose sweetest scent to heaven is blown. Prayer in the hubbub, linking all in one As each lone flower leans toward the Sun. Prayer in the groaning of a world in pain The darkness weeping for the dawn again. Prayer in my faltering words of guilt and shame The quiet whisper of a healing name. A living water welling up from deep A soil that nurtures roots through winter’s sleep A fire that blazes out with life, not death A breeze, a gale, the sharing of a breath. Prayer at the cross’s foot, an agony That dives down deeper than the abyss in me. Prayer at its height that, jabbing at the sky Pierces the Father’s heart with my heart’s cry. Prayer reaching out, a cosmos to embrace And gather all its prodigals in grace. Prayer in the depth, height, length and breadth of love Pray...

Harnhill is a Christian Healing Centre near Cirencester in the beautiful Cotswolds. Tucked away in the grounds is an ancient church with a numinous atmosphere, like many places which have been prayed in for generations. It's open, at least in daylight hours, and a most wonderful place to creep into on your own and spend some time with God... More info on https://www.harnhillcentre.org.uk/ Stained Glass at Harnhill   We are friends of the Bridegroom, apostles of staid gesture and astonished face. We strow gifts for the wedding over the sanctuary floor, carnadine and cobalt and chrome confetti for the Lord of light for the King is coming.   O floor, floor, floor, how blessed though thirty generations tread you down is your homely Cotswold stone: now to be kissed by His gifts of light, now to kiss His wounded feet, for the steps of the King of love have borne Him here and the feast is ready.

This poem had to be in sonnet form because it is about the mysterious "Dark Lady" who is said to have inspired some of Shakespeare's Sonnets. For convenience I have printed below four of his Sonnets which I particularly had in mind. Please note I don't imagine for a moment that there is any comparison between my scribblings and the work of the Master! Dark Lady Is that you, peering out between the lines, The fourteen bars he conjured for your cage? He lured you where eternal summer shines And promised you'd be free from mortal rage. We know a bit – he swears that you are fair – Your lips, your breasts, the black wires on your head – He says how much he loves your voice, but where Does he record a single word you said? So did he break your bondage to decay? We neither see nor hear you. He’s to blame. One word our greatest wordsmith didn’t say, He hasn’t even let us know your name. What strangely lifeless immortality. Is there a living Word to speak for me?       ...