I caught this morning morning’s minion…
My heart in hiding
Stirred for a bird, –the achieve of; the mastery of the thing!
~Gerard Manley Hopkins from “The Windhover”
Tag: dawn
Awaiting His Arrival: From Doing to Being
Everyone who heard this wondered about it, asking,
“What then is this child going to be?”
For the Lord’s hand was with him.
Luke 1: 66
What if, instead of doing something, we were to be something special?
Be a womb.
Be a dwelling for God.
Be surprised.
~Loretta Ross-Gotta from “To Be Virgin”
Morning Breaks to Silence
Well I know now the feel of dirt under the nails,
I know now the rhythm of furrowed ground under foot,
I have learned the sounds to listen for in the dusk,
the dawning and the noon.
I have held cornfields in the palm of my hand,
I have let the swaying wheat and rye run through my fingers,
I have learned when to be glad for sunlight and for sudden
thaw and for rain.
I know now what weariness is when the mind stops
and night is a dark blanket of peace and forgetting
and the morning breaks to the same ritual and the same
demands and the silence.
~Jane Clement from No One Can Stem the Tide
Why Bother?
For a bright and promising summer solstice morning:
Why do we bother with the rest of the day,
the swale of the afternoon,
the sudden dip into evening,
then night with his notorious perfumes,
his many-pointed stars?
…and if necessary, the windows—
trees fifty, a hundred years old
out there,
heavy clouds on the way
and the lawn steaming like a horse
in the early morning.
~Billy Collins from “Morning”
This Morning Time…
In the field sloping down,
Park-like, to where its willows showed the brook,
Haymakers rested…
But still. And all were silent. All was old,
This morning time, with a great age untold..
This morning time, with a great age untold..
~Edward Thomas from “Haymaking”
Daisy Dawn
…perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony.
It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun;
and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon.
It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike;
it may be that God makes every daisy separately,
but has never got tired of making them.
~G.K. Chesterton
There is a flower, a little flower
With silver crest and golden eye,
That welcomes every changing hour,
And weathers every sky.
~James Montgomery
Over the shoulders and slopes of the dune
I saw the white daisies go down to the sea,
A host in the sunshine, an army in June,
The people God sends us to set our heart free.
~William Bliss Carman
See, the grass is full of stars,
Fallen in their brightness;
Hearts they have of shining gold,
Rays of shining whiteness.
~Marjorie Pickthall from “Daisy Time”
Lifting the Gauze
Veil after veil of thin dusky gauze is lifted,
and by degrees
the forms and colours of things are restored to them,
and we watch the dawn
remaking the world in its antique pattern.
~Oscar Wilde from The Picture of Dorian Gray
Dawn is the time when nothing breathes, the hour of silence.
Everything is transfixed, only the light moves.
~Leonora Carrington
Listening to Lent — Death is Crushed
Oh, to see the dawn
Of the darkest day:
Christ on the road to Calvary.
Tried by sinful men,
Torn and beaten, then
Nailed to a cross of wood.
CHORUS:
This, the pow’r of the cross:
Christ became sin for us;
Took the blame, bore the wrath-
We stand forgiven at the cross.
Oh, to see the pain
Written on Your face,
Bearing the awesome weight of sin.
Ev’ry bitter thought,
Ev’ry evil deed
Crowning Your bloodstained brow.
Now the daylight flees;
Now the ground beneath
Quakes as its Maker bows His head.
Curtain torn in two,
Dead are raised to life;
“Finished!” the vict’ry cry.
Oh, to see my name
Written in the wounds,
For through Your suffering I am free.
Death is crushed to death;
Life is mine to live,
Won through Your selfless love.
This, the pow’r of the cross:
Son of God-slain for us.
What a love! What a cost!
We stand forgiven at the cross.
~Keith Getty and Stuart Townend
The Gilt Edge of Dawn
No matter what else today,
there was this…
a glowing, gilt-edged dawn
of promises.
Walking Toward the Dawn
All throughout these months as the shadows have lengthened,
this blessing has been gathering itself,
making ready, preparing for this night.
It has practiced walking in the dark,
traveling with its eyes closed,
feeling its way
by memory
by touch
by the pull of the moon
even as it wanes.
So believe me when I tell you this blessing will reach you
even if you have not light enough to read it;
it will find you even though you cannot see it coming.
You will know the moment of its arriving
by your release of the breath you have held so long;
a loosening of the clenching in your hands,
of the clutch around your heart;
a thinning of the darkness that had drawn itself around you.
This blessing does not mean to take the night away
but it knows its hidden roads,
knows the resting spots along the path,
knows what it means to travel
in the company of a friend.
So when this blessing comes, take its hand.
Get up.
Set out on the road you cannot see.
This is the night when you can trust
that any direction you go,
you will be walking toward the dawn.
~ Jan Richardson from “Through the Advent Door”
Barnstorming 