A Warning to My Readers, by Wendell Berry

Do not think me gentle
because I speak in praise
of gentleness, or elegant
because I honor the grace
that keeps this world. I am
...a man crude as any,
gross of speech, intolerant,
stubborn, angry, full
of fits and furies. That I
may have spoken well
at times, is not natural.
A wonder is what it is.

Breastplate prayer (or Lorica), by St. Patrick

I arise today
Through a mighty strength, the invocation of the Trinity,
Through a belief in the Threeness,
Through confession of the Oneness
Of the Creator of creation.

I arise today
Through the strength of Christ's birth and His baptism,
Through the strength of His crucifixion and His burial,
Through the strength of His resurrection and His ascension,
Through the strength of His descent for the judgment of doom.

I arise today
Through the strength of the love of cherubim,
In obedience of angels,
In service of archangels,
In the hope of resurrection to meet with reward,
In the prayers of patriarchs,
In preachings of the apostles,
In faiths of confessors,
In innocence of virgins,
In deeds of righteous men.

I arise today
Through the strength of heaven;
Light of the sun,
Splendor of fire,
Speed of lightning,
Swiftness of the wind,
Depth of the sea,
Stability of the earth,
Firmness of the rock.

I arise today
Through God's strength to pilot me;
God's might to uphold me,
God's wisdom to guide me,
God's eye to look before me,
God's ear to hear me,
God's word to speak for me,
God's hand to guard me,
God's way to lie before me,
God's shield to protect me,
God's hosts to save me
From snares of the devil,
From temptations of vices,
From every one who desires me ill,
Afar and anear,
Alone or in a mulitude.

I summon today all these powers between me and evil,
Against every cruel merciless power that opposes my body and soul,
Against incantations of false prophets,
Against black laws of pagandom,
Against false laws of heretics,
Against craft of idolatry,
Against spells of women and smiths and wizards,
Against every knowledge that corrupts man's body and soul.
Christ shield me today
Against poison, against burning,
Against drowning, against wounding,
So that reward may come to me in abundance.

Christ with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me,
Christ in me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me,
Christ on my right, Christ on my left,
Christ when I lie down, Christ when I sit down,
Christ in the heart of every man who thinks of me,
Christ in the mouth of every man who speaks of me,
Christ in the eye that sees me,
Christ in the ear that hears me.

I arise today
Through a mighty strength, the invocation of the Trinity,
Through a belief in the Threeness,
Through a confession of the Oneness
Of the Creator of creation

St. Patrick (ca. 377)

from Gilead, by Marilynne Robinson

I heard a man say once that Christians worship sorrow. That is by no means true. But we do believe there is a sacred mystery in it, it's fair to say that. There is something in her face I have always felt I must be sufficient to, as if there is a truth in it that tests the meaning of what I say. It's a fine face, very intelligent, but the sadness in it is engrafted into the intelligence, so to speak, until they seem one thing. I believe there is a dignity in sorrow simply because it is God's good pleasure that there should be. He is forever raising up those who are brought low.

by Thomas R. Kelly

Hasten unto Him who calls you in the silences of your heart.

Driving Down the Lane, by Gladys Schaefer (my dear, lovely friend)

Driving down the lane

on a cold spring morning,

sipping coffee

from a thick mug,

we are wrapped in winter’s clothing

grasped from the back

of the closet.

The yellow forsythia joins

the purple tulip tree

shouting aloud

“Spring has come!”

We pass a creek bed

overflowing its banks.

The rains have made the water reach for more.

The world has captured our attention

and we are grateful.

from Homily XXVII On Numbers, by Origen (cited in Depression, A Stubborn Darkness, by Ed Welch)

"My soul has long been on pilgrimage" (Ps. 119:54). Understand, then, if you can, what the pilgrimages of the soul are, especially when it laments with groaning and grief that it has been on pilgrimage so long. We understand these pilgrimages only dully and darkly so long as the pilgrimage still lasts. But when the soul has returned to its rest, that is, to the homeland of paradise, it will be taught more truly and will understand more truly the meaning of what the pilgrimage was.

this one is my own

Legacy

Like a tidal wave,
emotion surges,
slams against a wall of disbelief,
halts,
momentarily suspended.

Submerged in childhood narrative,
she remembers.
She, the child. Them, the mothers.
Sweet, broken women.
Earth’s heartache,
Heaven’s mercy.

Against so great a torrent,
she has no control.
Barrier breaks,
floods fall.
Powerful. Intense.
Containless.

Immersed in dreams unrealized,
she grieves.
Them, the child. She, the mother.
Redeemed, broken woman.
Earth’s heartache,
Heaven’s mercy.

Waters recede.

from bird by bird, by Anne Lamott

Becoming a writer can also profoundly change your life as a reader. One reads with a deeper appreciation and concentration, knowing how hard writing is, especially how hard it is to make it look effortless. You begin to read with a writer's eyes. You focus in a new way. You study how someone portrays his or her version of things in a way that is new and bold and original. You notice how a writer paints in a mesmerizing character or era for you, without your having the sense of being given a whole lot of information, and when you realize how artfully this has happened, you may actually put the book down for a moment and savor it, just to taste it.

from The School of Essential Ingredients, by Erica Bauermeister

"That's wonderful," said Abuelita when Lillian recounted the story to her the next day. "You made [your mother] remember her life. Now she just needs to reach out to it. That recipe," Abuelita said in answer to Lillian's questioning face, "must be yours. But you will find it," she continued. "You are a cook. It's a gift from your mother."

     Lillian raised an eyebrow skeptically. Abuelita gazed at her, gently amused.

     "Sometimes, nina, our greatest gifts grow from what we are not given."

The Artist of God (in memory of Fae Malania, by Marly Youmans

(Fae Malania wrote a lovely little book called Quantity of a Hazlenut -- a collection of essays on life and faith. Malania's husband was an Episcopal priest, who helped to update the Book of Common Prayer (in the 1970s, I think). When Malania passed away a few years back, Books and Culture published this poem, written in her memory by Marly Youmans. I was already a Fae Malania fan, and fell in love with the poem right away.)

The litter of fallen leaves is ankle-deep
And all my words are black ants on the page.
What can I say that's worthy of a life?

Your tower of private dreaming is no more.
Your mouth stops open like a chorister's,
The mirrors go veiled, the window's propped ajar.

"Ineffable," my dictionary sings
As starlight gilds the larches of paradise.
You drink from a shining cup and are made whole.

No, your isle of blessings is not like that.
It is beyond all our imaginings.
The words pour through me and are lost in mist.

The world in time's a dark and thirsty place.
Dear friend, from Paradise-the-blest, will you
Fetch me one drop to cool my burning tongue?

on Psalm 23, by David Roper

God is articulate. He speaks to us through is Word. Meditate on His words until His thoughts begin to take shape in your mind ...
   When we read His Word we are reading His mind -- what He knows, what He feels, what He wants, what He enjoys, what He desires, what He loves, what He hates.

from Jane Eyre (#2), by Charlotte Bronte

"Do you ever laugh, Miss Eyre? Don't trouble yourself to answer -- I see, you laugh rarely; but you can laugh very merrily: believe me, you are not naturally austere, any more than I am naturally vicious. The Lowood constraint still clings to you somewhat; controlling your features, muffling your voice, and restricting your limbs, and you fear in the presence of a man and a brother."

by George Eliot

If we had keen vision and feeling of all ordinary human life, it would be like hearing the grass grow and the squirrel's heart beat, and we should die of that roar which lies on the other side of silence.

from The Little White Horse, by Elizabeth Goudge

(Long, but worth it.)

They were at the door to the Merryweather pew, exactly underneath the pulpit, and Sir Benjamin was motioning to her to follow Miss Heliotrope inside. He followed her and shut the door with a click, and now she couldn't see anything of the church any more, except the roof and the tops of the arches and the upper part of the pulpit, for so high were its walls that the pew was like a little room.

   There was space on the cushioned seat that ran along the back wall for quite a family; a father and mother and ten children could have sat upon it in a row quite easily, Maria thought, so long as some of the children were quite tiny. And when she came to count the hassocks that stood in a row in front of the seat, she noted that there were twelve of them in order of size -- a great big one for the father of the family, and a tiny one, hardly bigger than a toadstool, for the youngest child. A broad shelf ran the length of the wall opposite the seat, broad enough for the father and the sons to put their hats on and the mother and daughters their reticules and parasols.

   It was all, in fact, most comfortable and homelike, and kneeling down upon a medium-sized hassock, letting her muff swing on its chain, and laying her prayer-book upon the shelf in front of her, she covered her face with her mittened hands and was glad, because in this pew, as well as in the manor-house, she felt that she had come home.

   "All people that on earth do dwell, sing to the Lord with cheerful voice.'

   The tremendous voice pealing out over her head nearly made her jump out of her skin. It sounded like a great trumpet annoucing the end of the world, and she scrambled up from her knees in alarm, almost expecting to see the roof of the church splitting open like a peapod and the blue sky above rolling up like a scroll to let the angels down. But it wasn't anything of that sort. It was only the Parson announcing the first hymn.

   But what a noise! She had thought Sir Benjamin had a powerful voice, but it was nothing to the Parson's. And at first sight she had thought Sir Benjamin an odd-looking elderly gentleman, but in oddness he couldn't hold a candle to the old man in the pulpit. Standing just below him, quite collected and demure again now, her muff still swinging on its chain, and her mittened hands holding her prayer-book, she looked straight up into his face and he looked straight down into hers with a keen searching look rather like Sir Benjamin's when they had first met. He gave a flashing smile, and she smiled back, and from that moment Maria Merryweather and the Parson of Silverydew were firm friends.

   But there was no doubt about it, he was a very extraordinary old man, more like a scarecrow than anything else. He was very tall and very thin, and he had a brown clean-shaven weatherbeaten face, fine and keen and proud, and beautifully shaped brown hands with very long fingers, and snow-white hair that nearly touched his shoulders. He wore a black cassock and white bands beneath his chin.

   He must have been very old, yet the dark eyes beneath his busy white eyebrows flashed fire, and his voice -- well, for power and volume it was enough to waken the dead. It was wonderfully clear-cut and articulate too, with just the faintest trace of some foreign intonation that gave it charm and originality. He gesticulated with his hands when he spoke, so that they seemed speaking too.

   'Now then, good people of Silverydew,' he cried, his flashing eyes passing over the packed congregation, 'with all your hearts and souls and voices sing praises.'  Then he raised his head and glanced at the choir in the gallery. 'And you up there, keep in tune for the love of God.'

   Then he suddenly whisked up a fiddle from somewhere inside the pulpit, tucked it under his chin, raised his right arm with the bow claped in his thin brown fingers, brought it down upon the strings with super artistry, and swung his people into the winging splendour of the Old Hundredth, with something of the dash and fire of a cavalry officer leading his men to the charge.

   What a row! Up in the gallery the fiddlers and the cellists and Digweed played like men possessed. Though she could not see them, Maria could picture their red perspiring faces, and their arms sawing back and forth, and their shining eyes almost popping out of their heads with eagerness and joy. And every man and woman and child in the congregation was singing at the top of his or her voice.

   Maria herself sang till her throat ached, with Sir Benjamin upon one side of her bellowing like a foghorn and Miss Heliotripe upon the other trilling like a nightingale. Miss Heliotrope's trilling astonished Maria. She had never heard Miss Heliotrope trill before. She hadn't even known she could trill.

   And it seemed to Maria, her imagination running riot to a shocking extent, that beyond the walls of the church she could hear all the birds in the valley singing, and the flowers singing, and the sheep and deer and rabbits singing in the park and woods and fields, and up on the slopes of the great hills. And somewhere the waves of the sea that she had not seen yet were rolling into Merryweather Bay, and crying Amen as they broke upon the shore.

   And up there in the tall pulpit stood the Parson playing the fiddle as Maria had never heard a fiddle played before, and never would again, because no one in all the world ever had, or ever would, play the fiddle as superbly as the Parson of Silverydew.

   The hymn ended and, with a soft rustling of the Sunday skirts and petticoats and a creaking of the seams of Sunday coats that were a bit too tight, the congregation sank upon its knees, with the Old Parson, laying aside his violin and standing very straight with his lean brown hands clasped upon his chest, closed his eyes, lifted his head and began to pray, his tremendous voice slightly lowered now, but so clear and true that if any members of his congregation missed a word here and there no excuse could be made for them unless they were stone deaf.

   Maria had never heard anyone pray like this Old Parson, and the way that he did it made her tremble all over with awe and joy. For he talked to God as if he were not only up in heaven, but standing beside him in the pulpit. And not only standing beside him but beside every man, woman, and child in the church -- God came alive for Maria as he prayed, and she was so excited and so happy that she could hardly draw her breath.

   And when the Old Parson read the Bible to his people, he did not read it in the sing-song sort of way that the parsons in London had read it, a way that made one want to go to sleep. He read it as though it were tremendously exciting; dispatches dictated on a battlefield, or a letter written only yesterday and bringing great news. And when he preached, taking as his subject the glorious beauty of the world, and the necessity for praising God for it every moment of the day or else standing convicted of an ingratitude so deep that it was too dreadful even to be spoken of, it was as thrilling as a thunderstorm. In London Maria had always thought about her clothes in the sermon or taken an interest in other members of the congregation, but today she only patted the pleats in her pelisse and stroked her muff a very few times, and only once craned her neck in a futile attempt to see a little something over the top of the pew door.

   Maria listenend spellbound. And when they sang the last hymn, in a way that almost lifted the roof off, she found that she was not tired at all, but feeling as fresh as when the service had started.

   After the last Amen had died away, the Old Parson climbed down from the pulpit, and went striding down the aisle, to stand at the west porch and greet his people as they filed out past him. Maria had never seen a parson do this before. But then she had never seen any parson in the least like this old man, or attended any service in the least like this one. Nothing in this enchanted valley seemed in the least like anything anywhere else.

from My Name is Asher Lev, by Chaim Potok

"That is where your pictures will hang in the spring," Anna Schaeffer said to me, pointing to the walls.
    I stared at her and felt a shock move through me.
   "I would have done it this year," she said. "But this old man would not let me."
   "He is still a boy this year," Jacob Kahn said. "A boy should not rush to make his soul naked."

from Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Bronte

... I had undergone a transforming process; that my mind had put off all it had borrowed of Miss Temple -- or rather that she had taken with her the serene atmosphere I had been breathing in her vicinity -- and that now I was left in my natural element, and beginning to feel the stirring of old emotions. It did not seem as if a prop were withdrawn, but rather as if a motive were gone; it was not the power to be tranquil which had failed me, but the reason for tranquility was no more. My world had, for some years, been Lowood; my experience had been of its rules and systems; now I remembered that the real world was wide, and that a varied field of hopes and fears, of sensations and excitements, awaited those who had courage to go forth into its expanse to seek real knowledge of life amidst its perils.

on Jesus, by Blaise Pascal

(One of my favorite co-op classes I ever taught was on scientists who were believers. Never one to really love science, I developed much more of a passion for it, and was awed to learn that some of the greatest scientists in history had very profound things to say about faith, the persons of the trinity, creation, etc.)

Not only do we know God by Jesus Christ alone, but we know ourselves by Jesus Christ. We know life and death only through Jesus Christ. Apart from Jesus Christ, we do not know what is our life, nor our death, nor God, nor ourselves.
                                                                                                                (c) Blaise Pascal

on God, by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

(This one makes me wish Mozart had fleshed out his thoughts a bit.) 


God is ever before my eyes. I realize His omnipotence and I fear His anger; but I also recognize His love, His compassion, and His tenderness towards His creatures.

from Daily Readings in the ABCs of Faith, by Frederick Buechner

Glory is to God what style is to an artist. A painting by Vermeer, a sonnet by Donne, a Mozart aria -- each is so rich with the style of the one who made it that to the connoisseur it couldn't have been made by anybody else, and the effect is staggering. The style of an artist brings you as close to the sound of his voice and the light in his eye as it is possible to get this side of actually shaking hands with him.

from Scent of Water, by Elizabeth Goudge

(my second-favorite passage from a book that's in my top 5 fiction best-reads)

The question came out so sharply and suddenly that I answered with the truth. I told him everything. It was the queerest thing that ever happened to me because I take such infinite trouble always to cover it all up. I hide it like a crime. And yet here I was laying it all out in front of him. I was like a criminal emptying his pockets. I took out everything. He was silent for a long time, rubbing his chin, and then he said, "You're afraid of it?"
   It seemed such a silly question and I spoke sharply I think when I said, "Of course I am, I'm terrified."
   "Why?" he asked. "If you lose your reason you lose it into the hands of God."

                                                                                                                           (c) 1963 by Elizabeth Goudge

on the theory of learning, from Intown Community School (Atlanta)

... it is important to note that we are not simply preparing a child for life, the child is a part of life now. Learning becomes a natural function of life because it fulfills aspects of the image of God in the child: dominion, creativity, intellect, emotion, volition, etc.

from bird by bird, by Anne Lamott

You are going to have to give and give and give, or there's no reason for you to be writing. You have to give from the deepest part of yourself, and you are going to have to go on giving, and the giving is going to have to be its own reward. There is no cosmic importance to your getting something published, but there is in learning to be a giver.

from Scent of Water, by Elizabeth Goudge

He had a round clerical hat, dusty and green with age. He put it on, gripped his umbrella in his left hand and held out his right to me. I held it and it was dry and rough and hot. "My dear," he said, "I will pray for you every day of my life until I die." 

   Then he abruptly let go of my hand, turned his back on me and stumbled down the steps that led from the front door to the drive. At the bottom he turned around again, and looking into his face I noticed that when he was neither eager nor alarmed his eyes had the most extraordinary quietness in them. "My dear," he said, "love, your God, is a trinity. There are three necessary prayers and they have three words each. They are these, 'Lord have mercy. Thee I adore. Into thy hands.' Not difficult to remember. If in times of distress you hold to these you will do well." Then he lifted his hat and turned around again. I stood at the door and watched him go. 

from Blue Like Jazz, by Donald Miller

... the Bible is so good with chocolate. I always thought the Bible was more of a salad thing, you know, but it isn't. It is a chocolate thing.

from Diary of an Old Soul, by George MacDonald

When I can no more stir my soul to move,
And life is but the ashes of a fire;
When I can but remember that my heart
Once used to live and love, long and aspire --
Oh be thou then the first, the one thou are;
Be thou the calling, before all answering love,
And in me wake hope, fear, boundless desire.

Diary of an Old Soul

from The Forgotten Garden, by Kate Morton

   "Life'd be a lot easier if it were like a fairy tale," said Cassandra, "if people belonged to stock character types."
   "Oh, but people do, they only think they don't. Even the person who insists such things don't exist is a cliche: the drear pedant who insists on his own uniqueness!"
   Cassandra took a sip of wine. "You don't think there's any such thing as uniqueness?"
   "We're all unique, just never in the ways we imagine."

from The Path of Celtic Prayer, by Calvin Miller

Call it romantic nonsense if you will, but there are epiphany moments, in which new revelations seem to summon us from a contentment with who we are to new spiritual adventures. These epiphanies enable us to cast off our dull religious comforts in favor of a riskier pilgrimage.

Welcome to my 'copybook'

For years, I've kept a copybook -- a journal filled with favorite quotes, poetry, song lyrics, even entire passages from books (both fiction and non-fiction). My copybook is black {imitation} leather, with tall, wispy wildflowers embossed on the cover, and sturdy beige pages.

Some of my favorite features of this treasured little copybook are the scribbles Isabella made in it when she was a toddler, and which I promptly labeled and numbered: "Isabella's contribution #1," "Isabella's contribution #2," "Isabella's contribution #3," and so-on. (I have to admit, I'm disappointed with myself for not devising a label much more clever than that.) On pages where Bella's scribbles covered an entire page, I allowed them that; where she scribbled less "verbosely," I simply wrote around them. This was no small thing. I had dreams of a lovely copybook -- always written in my very best handwriting using the very same inkpen on crisp, clean pages. I think I was something of a copybook purist. Or a copybook legalist, perhaps.

The date on page one is August 25, 2004. And while I've only filled about half the book (writing in it frequently during some seasons of life and hardly ever during others), I've referred to it hundreds of times. Whether I'm teaching a class, seeking to encourage someone who's struggling, needing to speak a bit of truth to myself, or simply hungry for the rhythm of beautiful writing, there's always literary sustenance in the pages of this copybook.

For many months, now, I've had a vision to share the entries from my copybook -- to inspire the world with this love of words, their cadence, and the ideas they convey. (Ok, so maybe "the world" is a lofty vision ... but perhaps I'll inspire a friend or two.) I also wanted to put the entries in a more organized format (i.e. labels), where I can easily find any particular entry.

Out of this vision, "I've Heard it Read {or sung or said}" was born. Each day (or two or three), I hope to add a new entry ... words worth pondering, worth remembering, worth sharing. May these words speak to you with the same power, beauty, and truth with which they've spoken to me.