A Vast Confusion, Lawrence Ferlinghetti

Long long I lay in the sands

Sounds of trains in the surf
in subways of the sea
And an even greater undersound
of a vast confusion in the universe
a rumbling and a roaring
as of some enormous creature turning
under sea and earth
a billion sotto voices murmuring
a vast muttering
a swelling stuttering
in ocean's speakers
world's voice-box heard with ear to sand
a shocked echoing
a shocking shouting
of all life's voices lost in night
And the tape of it
someow running backwards now
through the Moog Synthesizer of time
Chaos unscrambled
back to the first
harmonies
And the first light 

Gotye. Seriously.

Robert Frost, on Lent

Snow falling and night falling fast, oh, fast In a field I looked into going past, And the ground almost covered smooth in snow,

But a few weeds and stubble showing last.

The woods around it have it - it is theirs. All animals are smothered in their lairs. I am too absent-spirited to count;

The loneliness includes me unawares.

And lonely as it is, that loneliness Will be more lonely ere it will be less - A blanker whiteness of benighted snow

WIth no expression, nothing to express.

They cannot scare me with their empty spaces Between stars - on stars where no human race is. I have it in me so much nearer home

To scare myself with my own desert places.

water under the boat

When I first started this blog, years ago, I posted this poem:


Water in the boat is the ruin of the boat,
but water under the boat is its support.
Since Solomon cast the desire for wealth out from his heart,
he didn't call himself by any name but "poor."
The stoppered jar, though in rough water,
floated because of its empty heart.
When the wind of poverty is in anyone,
she floats in peace on the waters of the world.


Every year that I am preparing for Lent, I think of this line: "water in the boat is the ruin of the boat, but water under the boat is its support."  Lent is, at its core, an emptying of oneself, a letting go of our tight grip on all that we (perceive to) control.  Ash Wednesday ultimately reminds us that we have no control, the words spoken during the service of the ashes by Christians all over the world are these: "Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return." 



This year during Lent I am seeking not to tighten my grip on control, but to let go of it a bit, to remind myself of where I really stand; who I really am.  I will be both sacrificing and adding.  Giving up to make space.  Emptying to fill.  


St. Catherine of Sienna wrote this: 
"Wisdom is so kind and wise

that wherever you may look 

you can learn something about God. 

Why would not the omnipresent teach that way?"

Even in the wilderness of Lent, may we find God in every corner.