While I pass in my car
she emerges to remind me.
Feeling my vibration she safely tiptoes
backward from the road into
the cathedral of oaks—russet, and
wound
in wild grapes. A glimpse of leaves
stained in memory.
What if I left the speed of my car
and followed her quietly in,
covered my head and lit a fragile
flame?
Would she show me when to kneel
in the nave and when to shuffle
through the cloisters? I was not
raised
in a church like this. I feel lost.
But this is an old church in an even
older world. I start to see
its roots in the shapes of my toes.
I’m sure I can remember the liturgy.
There is great imagery in this poem, all pointing to the most pressing of human needs. We are driving our man-made cars down our man-made roads in search of that illusive thing that will hopefully fill our yearning. But what we truly yearn for, as many of the great epic poems have demonstrated, is our natural home, that place where we fit, where our authentic lives are inseparable from the rest of nature. I suspect that's why you abandon the car and follow the doe into the "cathedral of oaks." Indeed, we are hoping to find a place to kneel, hoping to find our roots, and hoping the remember the true place from whence we came.
ReplyDeleteGeorge, what you say so thoroughly and beautifully is it, utterly.
DeleteTwo things led to this poem, I think. (How do we really know the origins of poems?) One was an image of a 2000-year-old tree in Palma de Mallorca, right in the middle of the city. When I saw it I thought of all the engines and machines of steel and iron that have come and gone a thousand times in those 2000 years, and here is this tree, still alive, still blooming leaves. The other was driving by so many stands of trees in Michigan in beautiful autumn color, and imagining all the life that was happening within those stands, much of which must be kneeling. It is a sacred thing.
You know, I think all of my writing is looking for home, for my origins, for what gives Life. Thank you for understanding, my friend.
Oh and another origin: visiting "high" churches and cathedrals in Europe at age 19, after growing up in informal Baptist ones, I was smitten by their liturgical ritual and ceremony.
Deleteleaving the speed of the car is so important, your poem itself slowing down with the fragile flame, kneel, nave, shuffle and cloister. after this all we have to do is pay attention. we're already a part of the congregation))
ReplyDeletexo
erin
Erin, yes we are part of the congregation, and we need daily apprenticeship under wild things. Your listening in the trees on your lunch breaks is precious church going. xo
Deletethis sense of our separation from the holiness of the world -- isn't it ironic, that all the structure and ritual of religion may in essence be designed to get us back to where we left? if the world is sacred -- and i can't imagine anything else -- and if we are products of the world, then we, too, must be shot through with sacredness ... but so often it seems the things we have made rush us along, interpose themselves, distract too much ... i think we are, as george says above, "looking for a place to kneel," even when we think we are doing something else, and on occasion we are able to enter the real world like a neophyte monk ...
ReplyDeleteyou remind me of the archaic meaning of "temple" as an opening in the forest, a clearing or cleared place where the doe would lead us, if we stop the car and follow quietly ...
.
James, your great comment strikes me in the juxtaposition of two words: separation and holiness. The command Be ye holy as I am holy is of the meaning be ye separate. This is the teaching I grew up with anyway. Now isn't that ironic? It meant set apart.
DeleteAnd what could this mean, in Jesus' terms? Surely he didn't mean for us to be separate from nature. I was taught that it meant to be separate from the world. And of course what this resulted in was a lot of arrogant sin-snobs. I have come to believe that the only sin is separation, separateness, considering the rest of the world as other, including God. Well we could break out any exegesis we like. :-) I think sacred is more readily understood in that sense now than holy.
Many thanks.
paul tillich writes quite simply, sin is separation. i suppose he means separation from god, but also present in the christian tradition -- though not necessarily favored by the sin-snobs (a fine description :-) -- is the idea that the grace of god is displayed in the inherent goodness of the natural world, though sin -- which may almost be translated, human being -- has separated us from nature. in this case, holiness might be seen as god's immanence in nature, rather than as separation from nature (separation from the human world is a different thing -- perhaps this is the biblical meaning of qadash qadash qadash, sanctus sanctus sanctus, holy holy holy, as separation ...)
Deletebut of course you are absolutely right -- we can break out any exegesis we like and prove anything we want to prove (isn't this simultaneously the strength and the weakness of christian thought? :-)
more importantly, speaking from my own experience (and what else could i possibly have to offer?), i feel the presence of god most clearly in three places -- in poetry, with erin, and when i lose my self in the natural world. the longing for a place to kneel before this sense is the truest response i know ... the poem seems drenched with this longing, as do your words and what i know of your vision of the world ... my grateful for this continues to grow :-)))
.
YES to all you wrote. I remember when I was still in the church, longing to do that breaking apart, exegesis with reason. I wanted every text to be open for interpretation. Translation is interpretation! But sadly those who surrounded me were attached to their interpretations, so there could be no open discussion. This is really why I left! I think I could have stayed if there had been something like what I have heard Jews participate in, arguing the meaning of texts.
DeleteBut I think it is a blessing to let religion go, for myself. As a young child (yes) I believed there was something beneath religion, I was so confounded by declarations of exclusive truth. To feel the presence of God in these spaces you describe (and I wholeheartedly concur with all three for myself :))) is freedom. I also feel the presence of God when I read your words, James. And I really love the radiating love I feel when you and Erin type ))) ... these ciphers seem so suitable to expressing deep feeling in this inadequate context of comment boxes.)))
Great comments from your readers, and enjoyed very much your responses too, Ruth. Although on this occasion the doe safely tiptoes, I can't help picking up on the resonance of the meanings of 'wound' and 'stained'. Although you don't develop it, the hint of the fragility of the doe's life haunts one. Lovely poem.
ReplyDeleteRobert, I love to see where these things lead, don't you? Thank you for reading the poem and comments. As I wrote and revised this poem, I took out passages explicitly about the deer I have hit with my car (I called it "my notorious car" but that led to other suggestive images), so I am happy you picked up on the fragility of the doe with what I have left!
ReplyDeleteYes, I think your second version is a big improvement.
ReplyDeleteGood. My husband is an excellent reader and gave me helpful feedback. I don't know why I don't run more poems by him! Well I'm going to start.
DeletePicking up on Robert's and your follow-up comments: Often it is what we do not directly say in our poems that opens them to our readers. The hint is much better than the knock-out.
ReplyDeleteThat feeling of loss in your poem is also something to which I'm sensitive. That we can "feel lost" in a church, historically a place of sanctuary, a place that both celebrates life (through baptism) and death, is thought-provoking. I love how the poem uses the image of the doe as the reminder.
Dear Maureen, I feel you are so right about hints vs knock-out punches in poems. Sometimes it seems like an infinite process, removing words, adding words, removing them again. Over time it has gotten easier, and yet I still need another reader to assist, as with this one.
DeleteYour insightful comment about feeling lost in church makes me ponder how each individual experiences these things uniquely! For one, church forms are dead and deadening. For another, they connect her with all that is sacred and important in her heart. I really believe that religion or no religion does not matter; what matters is what E.M. Forster said: only connect.
Many thanks.
The poem stopped me cold, and when I went back to re-read it, I saw the title and it all fell in place.
ReplyDeleteI especially like the line,"I start to see its roots in the shape of my toes." It's particular in where it was placed, before remembering liturgy.
Creatures like us have traveled far from our roots, in so many ways, and this stopping the car and following a deer into the canopy of trees and foliage, takes us all back to our roots.
This is a new you, Ruth.
I wonder if anyone is chronicling how we are all influencing each other in this virtual world. I read the comments, and your responses as closely as I read the poem, absorbing meanings upon meanings. Then, something happens to me, I want to write something about this hunger we have, this need that you wrote about, and I think of how I miss my childhood church experience, and want that feeling again, but not exactly in the same way, with the same trappings.
This is most revealing, Ruth.
Rosaria, I reread the poem after your comment, trying to imagine it without the title, and it is rather chilling. :) And interesting in another way, isn't it? I wanted to express the kinship I feel with the doe, more than any other creature. I suppose she is the portal through which I feel linked to animals. I find the process of filtering my heart through the imagination of the doe a very satisfying and rich practice.
DeleteWhat you said is so true, about how we are evolving and are influenced by one another. So often I am prompted into thought and writing from something discussed in these pages. And also how different we are. I had no power as a child to connect with God in the context of my church experience, and so I have no wish to go back. Isn't it interesting? As I said to Maureen, each of us experiences these forms uniquely.
I am touched by your close attentions here, Rosaria.
Goosebumps Ruth! Speaks to this Heart! The Doe emerges to remind you (us through your poem)... inviting you/us to return to the Sacred within, the Sanctuary within - your/our *natural* roots infused with the memory of the true liturgy - born of the simple presence of the Divine in Nature, sung to the liturgy of the Heart - not in religious constructs... Beautiful imagery and inspiration. I feel the call too...
ReplyDeleteChristine, I am astonished by the possibility of this. Truly! We are so ready, so eager to connect and feel one another, to feel the deep Presence ourselves, and to find it in another person's expression. I don't think there is any greater joy than this.
DeleteI remember the first time I found spiritual ecstasy after I left the church. For years I had sat in the desert, dry and empty, but holding onto the Divine by my fingernails. "Find me" I said, "for I cannot find you." When my friend Inge got cancer and began a spiritual journey, she told me about her first session with a spiritual healer over a Bento box at lunch; I nearly lept over the table and sat in her lap, I was so awakened into bliss. It was what I had been waiting for: spirituality without religion. But again, as I have said in other comments, for some, religion is just the place where this bliss is found.
Thank you for goosebumps. :-)
Goosebumps again with your reply! "Find me, for I cannot find you." Oh Yes! I have said this many times in one form or another. As in: I give up, if you want me you're going to have to find me. :) I seem to be in a similar place now, at a crossroads spiritually - again... Guess that's why I feel like a meandering mystic! And there is still such a longing for the Sacred Presence and I will not settle until I have experienced that unadulterated expression of the Divine :) And I do believe that is possible - maybe I'm naive...
DeleteI laughed at the image of you leaping over the table - awakening to bliss, hearing Truth! Yes, everybody has to find their own way,to follow their own path, their Heart. I am currently curious about Hildegard of Bengin and the path of devotion. But I no longer consider myself a Christian - interesting dilemma. :) Also Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee a Sufi mystic speaks to my Heart more than any other... So I just keep following that Doe... :)
With gratitude...
And I am grateful. You are Rumi, looking for the divine friend. Why does Shams disappear? Why, after the introduction through the door into bliss does the ability to meet him elude us? Well it is a great prize worth seeking, and we will keep on, yes?
DeleteI read your readings at your blog, and all I can say is that we know what sparks the light inside. It does not matter where it comes from. What matters is that we look, and find, and feel the deep presence.
We walk on. Together.
Yes! Yes! Yes! Thank you for that... Humbly...
DeleteIn the same way I have said Farm is deep within all of us, Sister, I have a feeling so is the Doe's Sanctuary! This is beautiful.
ReplyDeleteI hope so, Boots. Even for those who would rather not camp out, there must be a longing for nature.
DeleteI am stuck. I do not know how to convey how this poem moves me: the doe, tiptoeing backward, leading you on into that cathedral of oak; the imagery, at once hushed and soaring (much like an actual cathedral); the "old church in an even/older world." And you, the barefoot pilgrim, ceding your self to it, the deep liturgy of Nature...true connection.
ReplyDeleteThank you.
DS, it makes me glad that you've come back, and just now to this poem about the doe. I thought often of you in the writing of it, as I know you associate this animal with me. So good to see you. xoxo
DeleteTrue places of worship are very welcoming and inviting and create a desire to be witnessed. I sense all of that in your words.
ReplyDelete