St. Francis and the Sow
Welcome to a beautiful reading of Galway Kinnell’s poem St. Francis and the Sow by Roger Housden, with Celedra in Roger’s cozy home.
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Sacred Poetry
Build a House for Grief
Build a house for Grief,
Tin roofed, for the company of rain.
Windows open wide, for breathing.
By a creek, at the end of the road.
Yours alone.
Take your time.
Build a house for Grief,
With a window seat, for watching.
Pillow it with faded quilts of old soft silk.
Hook up a clawfoot tub.
Stack thick towels nearby.
Find lavender studded soap.
Carry rocks from the creek bed, for the hearth.
Stack the chimney slowly, mortaring with memories.
Take your time.
When you find a heart rock, place it tenderly by the photo on the scarred kitchen table.
Build a house for Grief.
Take your time.
Make soup.
Bake bread.
Sweep the kitchen.
Keep one closet empty, lined with cedar.
Yours alone.
No one will hear you.
Dig a garden for Grief.
Watch sweet peas twine over sills and rise to the rafters.
Tuck bulbs into soil, for later.
Spit plum pits from the porch.
After the blossoms fall,
When the trees are tall enough, stretch a clothesline.
Wash a load of sheets.
Give them to the sky to dance themselves dry.
Grief will come home.
Kicking off her shoes at the door.
Letting herself in.
She has her own key.
Welcome her, with soup.
Stay up too late, talking.
Draw her a bath in a pool of moonlight.
Let her spend the night.
She will stay
As long
. . .as you need.
Sacred Poetry
Offerings
It doesn’t have to be much.
It hardly has to be spoken,
a word –
Even
an ordinary,
somewhat rounded,
small,
imperfect pebble
pulled from broken fragments of shell and drift,
once polished,
placed inside the center of your palm
and held out to the sky,
will let the sunlight sparkle through it.
What little it takes.
Sacred Poetry
A Morning Wish
Go sweet into the morning
join hands with your Spirit
Breathe deep and feel yourself grow
restless to begin
your first walk in the new day
The Eastern Sun at your back
the path before you invites
birdsong and a gentle morning breeze
come to tease the sixth of your senses
You were made to live this day
and smile on the face of God
Sacred Poetry
Ancient Tears
Ancient tears are now birthing
Soft white stars
In this long-endarkened womb,
Bringing to an end
Years of frantic searching
for the Beloved One.
Searching through disconnected phallus
and baby-makers
They too trying to demand their way
Into Paradise.
Exiled from our Homeland,
Fueled by the longing of the Wanderer,
The Great Betrayal enthrones a wrathful Armageddon
Hidden deep in the Heart’s knot
of protective refusal
Generation after generation.
Finally as the century turns
The wanderer reaches the shoreline at the far corner of the desert.
She plunges into this thirst-quenching ocean,
A never-ending deep and dark Silence.
Nothing seems to survive here.
My friend, what dies here is the lies of the Betrayer
And the fortress of her lies.
Through this death the Abyss opens even wider
Opens into the midnight sky.
Oh, luminous blue-black night
Where these ancient tears can finally be met
And take their rightful place
Sweet noble star lights of grace.
~ Ahria Wolf
Sacred Poetry
By the Time a Woman Ripens
By the time a woman ripens
She’s climbed many a mountain
To get over the hill
And into the promised land.
She’s also fallen off, been thrown off,
Flown off a few jagged cliffs in her time
And has come to know
That it is in the broken bones
And the breaking of her heart
That she has learned to free-fall
Into the satin blackness of Eternity,
Radiant deep peace, the promised land.
You see, if a woman is lucky,
By the time she ripens,
She has joined Inanna, gone down
And been hung out to dry, to fry, to drown.
Some scars you can see with the naked eye.
Others, like the underground belly wounds
You can only sense the fragrance of lotus flowers
Beginning to bloom
In an emerald oasis beyond time.
You see, by the time a woman ripens she is really this:
A skydancer made of dazzling starlight,
A sacred flame made of golden threads,
A wave in the ocean of God
Lapping the shoreline with You.
~ Ahria Wolf
Sacred Poetry
Outer Space.
Inner Space.
Possibilities of Space.
In the Metaphor of our Existence,
May We All See the Light
Of Infinite Space.
- Jan West
Sacred Poetry Contest
It is our highest intention to serve those who seek a path of meaning by creating the national resource for sacred living. Because the beauty and meaning of sacred art, music and poetry supports and inspires intentional living, it is our desire to support sacred artists by sharing their work. In this spirit Touchstones of the Sacred is pleased to announce our first ever poetry contest! We seek all styles and forms of poetry especially contemplative, introspective, ecstatic poetry and Haiku but there are no limits!
On July 1st one poem will be selected and the winning poet will receive a desktop prayer wheel that was handcrafted in Tibet. Send up to 5 poems to matsya@celedra.com by June 30th. Poems will be published to our site and we invite you to join the fun and share your comments.
One
THERE IS A RIVER
AND IT RUNS
PURELY
SIMPLY
BY ITS AFFINITY
OF SPIRIT
EXISTING BETWEEN
JOY
OF HEART
AND ALIVENESS
IN BANISHING
SEPARATION
TO TOUCH
WITH WORDS
LAUGHTER
WITH SOUL
HOLY IS
ALL
CONNECTION
Essential Shadow
Ill on the inside candor eludes
dodging light and opting
instead for the lies
passed around at board
meetings like propaganda
Cock and bull creation.
Unconscious cannot be
conscious
Deception hovers waiting
its turn
Coveting its place.
Codify your darkness
mistrust failure insecurity
Grant order to chaos
of the heart
Seek solace perpetually
In another?s tenet.
Unconscious cannot be
conscious
Deception hovers waiting
its turn
Coveting its place.
Intrinsic to each to all
Struggle assimilate value
Darkness to illumination
Hand in hand a balance
Vital as blood breath
Petition truth as heroic quest.
