The Poetic Voice

This past week I was at the Cathedral College in Washington, which is part of the National Cathedral, educating clergy and lay on issues related to ministry and spirituality and many other aspects of life. It was a wonderfully liberating experience, and I am grateful for having had the opportunity. The program was quite similar to one I attended about this time last year, and featured as leader Esther de Waal, in residence from Wales. Returning to lead with her, as last year, were Bonnie Thurston and Kathleen Staudt, poets and teachers in academic settings among other distinctions so numerous I won’t list them all. Joining them this year was the outgoing Poet Laureate of Maryland, Michael Glaser, also a professor. His Jewish background provided rich nuances of theological understanding, and he was also excited about his own growth as he drank in the richness of the Cathedral services we attended.

Enough of the background for my week there, which can’t really provide the sense of what the week meant for me, as I continue to learn more about my own writing and its connection to the poetic imagination. The conference theme was “Approaching God through Poetry,” although one of the poets commented that in truth we don’t approach God, but rather God approaches us. Another interesting exchange had to do with the comment by one that poems are prayers and the questioning of that view by another of the poet session leaders. Dean of the Cathedral, Sam Lloyd, presented a session on the Welsh poet R.S.Thomas, as he had last year.

With great sadness, we learned of the financial difficulties at the Cathedral and the College, which will result in the closing of the College March 31, after more than 50 years (maybe more) of providing enrichment for its Fellows, scholars, and conference attendees. Staff at the Cathedral are also facing lay-offs, and so there was an underlying sadness and anticipated grief over these changes. Even the great Cathedral, “House of Prayer for All People,” cannot overcome the financial threats that have befallen our national economy. At least for now.

Some time in the coming months I will give a Coffee & Conversation session on poetry as a way of seeing: our faith, our inspirations, our understandings. I will try to help all of us see that poetry is not to be something mysterious and to be feared but rather what speaks to our deepest senses. Using many examples as our guide perhaps we too can allow that spirit to give us light on the journey we travel in faith.

As a way of closing for now, I want to share what I have found to be an almost perfect poem. I clipped it some years ago from Christian Century. I am always finding more clues to the profound faith expressed here in simple words. The poet is Kathleen L. Housley, not a household name nor a Pulitzer winner. The poem was in the April 4, 2001 issue of the magazine, and reflects the gospel texts in succinct allusions, using the image of baptism to point to even deeper meanings. It will take several readings to begin to realize what is written in these lines.

By water and by spirit
Kathleen L. Housley

Before he sought the river’s cool water
at the end of the afternoon to wash
away the sawdust that coated his arms
and hair like pollen, leaving his mallet
on an upturned manger in need of a leg,
and his adze resting on a half-formed yoke,
he had been whittling sheep so perfect
that when he set them down gently on the work bench,
they had begun to graze among the shavings,
and mosquitos that buzzed as he flicked them
loose from the pine with the point of his knife
to torment the rounded haunches of a bear
gnawing on fish bones no bigger than pins.
And when he had finished, he had taken
his own body in his hands, shaping himself
into an olive tree in early spring about to bloom,
which was what the dove had glimpsed
as it dropped down from the clouds,
seeking only a branch on which to rest.