For the director of music: Psalm 4
What if we could see all the days of our life at once, like opening all the doors of an Advent calendar on the 1st of December? Perhaps you haven’t been able to handle all the excitement, couldn’t wait, and have already opened all the doors?
Today is the day before the night before Christmas and so there should be at least one door left to open. Just one more day before Donald Duck (Sweden) and Santa Claus (USA) make their grand entrance through the boob tube or the chimney.**
In the meantime, throughout Advent, something is already going on, she’s on her way, expecting. It’s a dark (Sweden), but hopeful, joyful time of year, especially if we are prepared to wait. This is time to learn the virtues of patience, of living from day to day, and the value of rhythm in a sense we don't usually think of. It’s a time to rekindle hope and expectation, a sense of family and community. This is also a time to prepare for surprises…for creativity and the unknown. Advent – which means the coming and arrival of something momentous – is meant to teach us that time in itself is holy.
At this point in my own life, I’ve certainly opened a good number of doors. Let me take this opportunity to share with you what was behind a few of those doors. Though these are four images from my own personal calendar of life, I have chosen them because I am sure that they say something about a life and time we already share.
Let me begin with my early childhood, when my expectations of life were perhaps at their height. Behind one of those doors was a:
Music box in the crèche under our Christmas tree. Ever since I can remember, I can recall lying down under the tree and winding up the music box hidden in the manger, and listening to the delicate tinkling melody of ‘Silent Night’. Nothing could stir the spirit of Christmas in our household the way that magic music box could.
Later in life, perhaps in one of my teenage years, I remember that the box had been wound up, but that I could hardly hear the music. For a brief moment I felt a surge of adrenalin, thinking that I had suddenly become deaf. I threw myself onto the floor, beside my sister, and propped my head in my hands as close to the manger as we could get. There we could clearly hear the melody. We noted how it had become worn, quieter, though not silent, over the years. We were growing up.
Several years later, there was a door that opened onto a:
Starry sky This time I was lying on my back, in a sleeping bag, on a mossy patch in the Wasatch mountains. For some reason the Silent Night melody came to mind. As I hummed it to myself, it occurred to me that many children of the world are born in the calm and quiet of the night, under these same constellations. While the actual melody in the music box had weakened, its meaning had somehow intensified, deepened, perhaps matured within me.
Let’s see, some 20 years later, I awoke to the sound of a:
Telephone ringing I think every time we answer the phone it’s kind of like opening a door to an Advent Calendar, at least it was then, because then you never knew who might be calling. In this case it was some close friends of mine, who were calling from abroad to tell me that they had just received a young child. After several years of trying to adopt, they happened to visit a children’s home where a nun had met them at the door and said "This morning, during my prayers, I was told that a beautiful little boy was to go to the first willing couple who passed through this door today. Are you willing?” My friends were elated, and confirmed “YES” they were willing. Later they called to ask me if I could be his godmother, by default...because they simply couldn’t think of anyone else. I too said ‘YES’. It was one of the best decisions in my life, mind you.
…to be continued. I promise to open the 4th door tomorrow, on Christmas Eve.
*translation of a devotional I held for a Salvation Army youth choir in Stockholm, Sweden, on 1 December 2003. **editing 2007.
Sunday, December 23, 2007
Monday, December 17, 2007
Advent Psalm 3
For Jeduthun, the director of music. To the tune of “Praise and Judgment”
While her mother is deeply troubled by the fragility of the human life she carries within, she herself has become that fragile life. In the silence of the night, a mother can no longer suppress her anguish, and so Logos takes its dwelling within her and us, and the dignity of human nature is restored.
Doctors say she has a sharp pen (as opposed to a 'sharp tongue', which pleases her), a way with words, as though they come easily. What do we know?
But when deep calls to deep, at night, this song is with me, and I wonder: what does the unborn child hope for?
...to be con't.
“Each man’s life is but a breath” (Ps 39)
While her mother is deeply troubled by the fragility of the human life she carries within, she herself has become that fragile life. In the silence of the night, a mother can no longer suppress her anguish, and so Logos takes its dwelling within her and us, and the dignity of human nature is restored.
Doctors say she has a sharp pen (as opposed to a 'sharp tongue', which pleases her), a way with words, as though they come easily. What do we know?
But when deep calls to deep, at night, this song is with me, and I wonder: what does the unborn child hope for?
...to be con't.
“Each man’s life is but a breath” (Ps 39)
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Advent psalm 2
For the director of music
The fact that I could control the feeling and the sounds of my own breathing was my initial solace. In the wake of sudden deafness, I had decided to focus on feeling the 'sounds' that I could make and control, and breathing was a given starter. Song became the first expression of that focus since it generated more overtones, more resonant vibration, than speech.
What a comfort to find myself re-membering beautiful old sounds and melodies. How consoling to both hear and literally feel the words, the pitch, the timbre, rhythm and beat of familiar sounds as I repeated them. And so I sang over and over, listening and feeling ever so alive. I could feel the weight of each word as it resounded throughout my body, especially in the cavities of my chest and head. Many a song embraced me as though I were in my own womb. Familiar vibrations from within gently rocked me while faint sounds around and about carried me off to somewhere I'd never been before. Joy came to heart and mind, when suddenly I was filled with the hope of an unborn child.
...to be con't.
The fact that I could control the feeling and the sounds of my own breathing was my initial solace. In the wake of sudden deafness, I had decided to focus on feeling the 'sounds' that I could make and control, and breathing was a given starter. Song became the first expression of that focus since it generated more overtones, more resonant vibration, than speech.
What a comfort to find myself re-membering beautiful old sounds and melodies. How consoling to both hear and literally feel the words, the pitch, the timbre, rhythm and beat of familiar sounds as I repeated them. And so I sang over and over, listening and feeling ever so alive. I could feel the weight of each word as it resounded throughout my body, especially in the cavities of my chest and head. Many a song embraced me as though I were in my own womb. Familiar vibrations from within gently rocked me while faint sounds around and about carried me off to somewhere I'd never been before. Joy came to heart and mind, when suddenly I was filled with the hope of an unborn child.
...to be con't.
Sunday, December 9, 2007
For the director of music
Advent psalm 1
When I suddenly became unilaterally deaf a few years ago, I realized what a sensitive algorithm our brains have developed to make use of signals from our inner ears, a kind of built-in GPS that helps us to position ourselves in space. Since the algorithm requires the data signals from two positions, i.e.two ears, I was suddenly not just deaf in one ear but also unable to calculate my position. Suddenly, without a functioning GPS and no other system in place, I was disoriented, confused, dizzy. Where was I, did I exist at all?
I was soon to discover that sound is something to which my entire body – not just the cilia of my inner ear – reacts. In stillness, silence and solitude, my body was now making me keenly aware of my heartbeat, my breathing and the tiniest tremors of my muscles and bones. As I ventured out of doors, I sometimes had to lean against a wall to steady myself in relationship to what appeared to be a bouncing sidewalk, as opposed to my own rebounding body. The catastrophe in my inner ear had affected my balance too. But even with a brick wall to support me, I was unable to defend myself against the relentless drone of city emissions or flee from all the invisible detonations. The human body has apparently evolved to react instinctively to explosive sounds, with a surge of adrenalin to propel its flight away from any potential source of danger. Plenty of adrenalin, but to what avail? Without a sense of direction, I could do nothing but succumb.
I could literally feel my body jerk and twitch to the sound of a car door slamming shut. And like a blotting paper against spilled ink, I apparently had no choice but to absorb the ultrasounds of passing traffic. I was forced to reverberate to the asynchronic pulse of pistons firing from behind a stop light. I had no choice but to confront all the palpable waves being generated when hard rubber grips the asphalt, and breathe in all the fits and starts of exhaustion.
Throughout my torso and limbs I suddenly felt what I could no longer hear. To protect myself from all the sudden intrusions, the violence and confusion of so many new signals, I knew I would have to limit my focus. I was reminded of the way blinders manage to calm a farm horse in city traffic, by curtailing side vision. Perhaps I needed a leather flap on my ears, a pilot's cap, to cut out unwanted feelings. I tried all sorts of earplugs, and was occasionally relieved, though I knew I needed more to refine my inner focus.
And so I began by focusing on the omniscient 'sounds' of my own life, those generated by my own living body, by my own nervous system. I was forced to spend hours on end in stillness and silence. I had to begin by becoming aware of the difference between all the vibrations, movements, rhythms and pulses within myself, from those generated by the world around me.
As my brain continued in vain to call for signals from my poisoned inner ear, I ‘heard’ the hiss of a snake coiled in my cochlea, ever ready to strike again. On days when I had been exposed to a lot of ambient sound, this viper seemed to become envious and hissed with a pitch that rose like a whistling tea kettle until it managed to pierce some indefinite barrier. Having managed to break through something it proceeded to gurgle and cluck, like a radiator that needed to be aired or a contented baby, depending upon how I felt. I think I have learned to interpret this viper's behavior quite well over the past few years, and though its autonomous life remains at odds with mine, I have also learned to live with it.
If my heartbeat, my pulse, and the growling and bubbling of my gastrointestinal tract are other involuntary 'sounds' of my life, then the vibrations associated with my breathing are not. The fact that I could control the feeling and 'sound' of my own breathing was my first solace after the catastrophe. I decided to focus on feeling the 'sounds' that I could make and control. I was going to let the sounds of my own body, the uncontrollable and controllable, tell me something first. Then if I could come to terms with the focus of my new inner ear, perhaps I could share my 'insights' with others.
...to be con't.
When I suddenly became unilaterally deaf a few years ago, I realized what a sensitive algorithm our brains have developed to make use of signals from our inner ears, a kind of built-in GPS that helps us to position ourselves in space. Since the algorithm requires the data signals from two positions, i.e.two ears, I was suddenly not just deaf in one ear but also unable to calculate my position. Suddenly, without a functioning GPS and no other system in place, I was disoriented, confused, dizzy. Where was I, did I exist at all?
I was soon to discover that sound is something to which my entire body – not just the cilia of my inner ear – reacts. In stillness, silence and solitude, my body was now making me keenly aware of my heartbeat, my breathing and the tiniest tremors of my muscles and bones. As I ventured out of doors, I sometimes had to lean against a wall to steady myself in relationship to what appeared to be a bouncing sidewalk, as opposed to my own rebounding body. The catastrophe in my inner ear had affected my balance too. But even with a brick wall to support me, I was unable to defend myself against the relentless drone of city emissions or flee from all the invisible detonations. The human body has apparently evolved to react instinctively to explosive sounds, with a surge of adrenalin to propel its flight away from any potential source of danger. Plenty of adrenalin, but to what avail? Without a sense of direction, I could do nothing but succumb.
I could literally feel my body jerk and twitch to the sound of a car door slamming shut. And like a blotting paper against spilled ink, I apparently had no choice but to absorb the ultrasounds of passing traffic. I was forced to reverberate to the asynchronic pulse of pistons firing from behind a stop light. I had no choice but to confront all the palpable waves being generated when hard rubber grips the asphalt, and breathe in all the fits and starts of exhaustion.
Throughout my torso and limbs I suddenly felt what I could no longer hear. To protect myself from all the sudden intrusions, the violence and confusion of so many new signals, I knew I would have to limit my focus. I was reminded of the way blinders manage to calm a farm horse in city traffic, by curtailing side vision. Perhaps I needed a leather flap on my ears, a pilot's cap, to cut out unwanted feelings. I tried all sorts of earplugs, and was occasionally relieved, though I knew I needed more to refine my inner focus.
And so I began by focusing on the omniscient 'sounds' of my own life, those generated by my own living body, by my own nervous system. I was forced to spend hours on end in stillness and silence. I had to begin by becoming aware of the difference between all the vibrations, movements, rhythms and pulses within myself, from those generated by the world around me.
As my brain continued in vain to call for signals from my poisoned inner ear, I ‘heard’ the hiss of a snake coiled in my cochlea, ever ready to strike again. On days when I had been exposed to a lot of ambient sound, this viper seemed to become envious and hissed with a pitch that rose like a whistling tea kettle until it managed to pierce some indefinite barrier. Having managed to break through something it proceeded to gurgle and cluck, like a radiator that needed to be aired or a contented baby, depending upon how I felt. I think I have learned to interpret this viper's behavior quite well over the past few years, and though its autonomous life remains at odds with mine, I have also learned to live with it.
If my heartbeat, my pulse, and the growling and bubbling of my gastrointestinal tract are other involuntary 'sounds' of my life, then the vibrations associated with my breathing are not. The fact that I could control the feeling and 'sound' of my own breathing was my first solace after the catastrophe. I decided to focus on feeling the 'sounds' that I could make and control. I was going to let the sounds of my own body, the uncontrollable and controllable, tell me something first. Then if I could come to terms with the focus of my new inner ear, perhaps I could share my 'insights' with others.
...to be con't.
Wednesday, November 14, 2007
A word's worth
Dedicated to whomever treasures the spirit of literature, the arms of writers and readers as they reach out to one another in the cosmos.
The first poem I ever learned by heart was "Daffodils" by William Wordsworth. I can remember reciting about half of it in front of my 6th grade class, when all of a sudden I went blank, blacked out, and broke into tears. I'll never forget how my teacher, a lovely dark-haired spinster who was undoubtedly fraught by having encouraged my premature recital, tried to console me in the cloak room at the back of the class. "But I knew it by heart," I sobbed. "I know," she said "and next time it will be with your whole heart and soul." While I didn't understand what she meant at the time, I was relieved.
The poem has since been recharged in another place, at another time of life, when truly alone "in blissful solitude" I suddenly ran across "a host, of golden daffodils...stretch'd in never-ending line along the margin of the bay". It was on a trail along Tomales Bay, out on the Point Reyes peninsula. It was your birthday in March, C, and you were pregnant, expecting a son. A golden bouquet was gathered and given. I also ran across a herd of wild elk that same day, on that same path.
For years, there was only that one Wordsworth in my world. I had to laugh and cry the other day when I was looking for some poems by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and discovered that he had acquired the middlename Wordsworth on the Internet. Today, I am constantly lifting my feather duster to spare myself of the unsightly cobwebs of misspelled wads, unconjugated verbs, undeclined nouns, mixed metaphors and hence meaningless banter on the Internet. Would that I could spare others. Who are these bloggers, hanging from a summer gossamer every day, night and time of the year? Who is this Babel, this world's most indispensible networker, who calls himself a 'Poet'? Alexander Pope wrote "fools rush in where angels fear to tread" in his poetic Essay on Criticism.
In the meantime, I've become more interested in all the politically incorrect feminist writers and doers, all the spinsters toward whom Freudian thought has only served to exacerbate scorn. I'm fascinated by those who prefer the go to the show, who thrive on the stimulus of intellectual pursuit, and are easily fatigued by choppy chatter. By choppy chatter I mean the barrage of empty words, abrupt sentences, bits and pieces of broken conversation, and unanswered questions, however trivial, that often crop up around a family dinner table, as well as on the Internet. Choppy chatter is breaking dishes as opposed to bread, and all the other sounds that people make (and words people write) when they are alone in the company of others.
I am curious about the independent thinkers who for good reason defy convention. I wonder about Florence Nightingale, for example, a prolific writer in later years, who described how women of her (upper) class used to spend their days lying on their sofas and telling each other how to avoid fatigue by putting flowers into vases. Florence Nightingale chose evidently not to be a wife of noble character (Pr 31:10-31), a socialite, or a femme fatale, but rather a strong social servant with personal integrity and a non-moral conscience. As soon as we are reminded of the reality of these women, the fictitious is no longer foul but somehow fragrant. It is from this perspective that I now savor H. Wadsworth Longfellow's contributions, in that hour of misery, to the myth (excerpts from Santa Filomena):
Lo, In that hour of misery
A Lady with a Lamp I see
Pass through the glimmering gloom
And flit from room to room.
And slow, as in a dream of bliss
The speechless sufferer turns to kiss
Her shadow as it falls.
The first poem I ever learned by heart was "Daffodils" by William Wordsworth. I can remember reciting about half of it in front of my 6th grade class, when all of a sudden I went blank, blacked out, and broke into tears. I'll never forget how my teacher, a lovely dark-haired spinster who was undoubtedly fraught by having encouraged my premature recital, tried to console me in the cloak room at the back of the class. "But I knew it by heart," I sobbed. "I know," she said "and next time it will be with your whole heart and soul." While I didn't understand what she meant at the time, I was relieved.
The poem has since been recharged in another place, at another time of life, when truly alone "in blissful solitude" I suddenly ran across "a host, of golden daffodils...stretch'd in never-ending line along the margin of the bay". It was on a trail along Tomales Bay, out on the Point Reyes peninsula. It was your birthday in March, C, and you were pregnant, expecting a son. A golden bouquet was gathered and given. I also ran across a herd of wild elk that same day, on that same path.
For years, there was only that one Wordsworth in my world. I had to laugh and cry the other day when I was looking for some poems by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and discovered that he had acquired the middlename Wordsworth on the Internet. Today, I am constantly lifting my feather duster to spare myself of the unsightly cobwebs of misspelled wads, unconjugated verbs, undeclined nouns, mixed metaphors and hence meaningless banter on the Internet. Would that I could spare others. Who are these bloggers, hanging from a summer gossamer every day, night and time of the year? Who is this Babel, this world's most indispensible networker, who calls himself a 'Poet'? Alexander Pope wrote "fools rush in where angels fear to tread" in his poetic Essay on Criticism.
In the meantime, I've become more interested in all the politically incorrect feminist writers and doers, all the spinsters toward whom Freudian thought has only served to exacerbate scorn. I'm fascinated by those who prefer the go to the show, who thrive on the stimulus of intellectual pursuit, and are easily fatigued by choppy chatter. By choppy chatter I mean the barrage of empty words, abrupt sentences, bits and pieces of broken conversation, and unanswered questions, however trivial, that often crop up around a family dinner table, as well as on the Internet. Choppy chatter is breaking dishes as opposed to bread, and all the other sounds that people make (and words people write) when they are alone in the company of others.
I am curious about the independent thinkers who for good reason defy convention. I wonder about Florence Nightingale, for example, a prolific writer in later years, who described how women of her (upper) class used to spend their days lying on their sofas and telling each other how to avoid fatigue by putting flowers into vases. Florence Nightingale chose evidently not to be a wife of noble character (Pr 31:10-31), a socialite, or a femme fatale, but rather a strong social servant with personal integrity and a non-moral conscience. As soon as we are reminded of the reality of these women, the fictitious is no longer foul but somehow fragrant. It is from this perspective that I now savor H. Wadsworth Longfellow's contributions, in that hour of misery, to the myth (excerpts from Santa Filomena):
Lo, In that hour of misery
A Lady with a Lamp I see
Pass through the glimmering gloom
And flit from room to room.
And slow, as in a dream of bliss
The speechless sufferer turns to kiss
Her shadow as it falls.
Friday, November 2, 2007
Misericord
Today is All Souls Day, a day of rest. Fortunately, I have succeeded in creating a restful kind of a ‘misericord’ in my home.
Words like ‘misericord’ can otherwise keep me awake for days and nights on end. Mother Anne once accused me of esoteric interests. When I asked her what she meant, she suggested I look up the word (esoteric) in my dictionary. In the first sense of the word 'misericord', I think of the souls of all those who have gone before us. I think today mostly of the love for life that mother Anne let go of on Midsummer Eve earlier this year. In accordance with the etymology of the word, may the good Lord have mercy on her soul.
Today I have also had time to wonder what it is about the ‘misericords’, the carved wooden ledges on the folding seats in churches, that I find so fascinating? Is it because they once allowed the choir to perch, to half sit and rest, while singing a high mass? Having been rehearsing the first soprano part of a modern mass for weeks now, I am still unsure of my ability to make a pure contribution. Misericords were also called “mercy seats” because they provided relief from long hours of rehearsal, and standing in prayer.
It is also some solace to know that they were usually carved by apprentices rather than by the masters. Perhaps my fascination lies more in the fact that their motifs - otherwise hidden from the seated congregation – were privy to the musing of singers like me. In my reading of a novel by Gail Godwin this morning, I learned that they were often elaborately carved with intimate scenes from nature, and everyday domestic life, rather than with religious motifs. They might, for example, depict a pair of snails crawling around one another in circles, childplay, a woman preparing a meal, or a man washing clothes.
According to the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, ‘misericord’ is also a word used to describe the relaxation of a monastic rule, as well a the room reserved for monks who have been granted such dispensation. It is perhaps ironic that just this weekend I have a close friend from out-of-town, who happens to be a monk, visiting. Next weekend, another close friend will come to visit. Needless-to-say it is a pleasure to be able to share ‘misericord’ motifs – room for relaxation – in my home with good friends.
Words like ‘misericord’ can otherwise keep me awake for days and nights on end. Mother Anne once accused me of esoteric interests. When I asked her what she meant, she suggested I look up the word (esoteric) in my dictionary. In the first sense of the word 'misericord', I think of the souls of all those who have gone before us. I think today mostly of the love for life that mother Anne let go of on Midsummer Eve earlier this year. In accordance with the etymology of the word, may the good Lord have mercy on her soul.
Today I have also had time to wonder what it is about the ‘misericords’, the carved wooden ledges on the folding seats in churches, that I find so fascinating? Is it because they once allowed the choir to perch, to half sit and rest, while singing a high mass? Having been rehearsing the first soprano part of a modern mass for weeks now, I am still unsure of my ability to make a pure contribution. Misericords were also called “mercy seats” because they provided relief from long hours of rehearsal, and standing in prayer.
It is also some solace to know that they were usually carved by apprentices rather than by the masters. Perhaps my fascination lies more in the fact that their motifs - otherwise hidden from the seated congregation – were privy to the musing of singers like me. In my reading of a novel by Gail Godwin this morning, I learned that they were often elaborately carved with intimate scenes from nature, and everyday domestic life, rather than with religious motifs. They might, for example, depict a pair of snails crawling around one another in circles, childplay, a woman preparing a meal, or a man washing clothes.
According to the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, ‘misericord’ is also a word used to describe the relaxation of a monastic rule, as well a the room reserved for monks who have been granted such dispensation. It is perhaps ironic that just this weekend I have a close friend from out-of-town, who happens to be a monk, visiting. Next weekend, another close friend will come to visit. Needless-to-say it is a pleasure to be able to share ‘misericord’ motifs – room for relaxation – in my home with good friends.
Sunday, October 28, 2007
Little green apples and I
Many, many years ago Mother Anne came to visit me in Sweden. She brought me a music box. This afternoon, I wound it up and played it, watching the two children atop the box as they rose and fell and rose again on a seasaw, to the tune of...? I remembered that the song had something to do with apples and Indianapolis - because Mother Anne had hummed the refrain for me - but I had no idea what the song was actually about. I found the lyrics today:
And I wake up in the mornin' With my hair down in my eyes and she says "Hi" And I stumble to the breakfast table While the kids are goin' off to schoolgoodbye And she reaches out 'n' takes my hand And squeezes it 'n' says "How ya feelin', hon?" And I look across at smilin' lips That warm my heart and see my mornin' sun And if that's not lovin' me Then all I've got to say God didn't make little green apples And it don't rain in Indianapolis in the summertime And there's no such thing as Doctor Seuss Or Disneyland, and Mother Goose, no nursery rhyme God didn't make little green apples And it don't rain in Indianapolis in the summertime And when my self is feelin' low I think about her face aglow and ease my mind Sometimes I call her up at home knowin' she's busy And ask her if she could get away and meet me And maybe we could grab a bite to eat And she drops what she's doin' and she hurries down to meet me And I'm always late But she sits waitin' patiently and smiles when she first sees me 'cause she's made that way And if that ain't lovin' me Then all I've got to say God didn't make little green apples And it don't snow in Minneapolis when the winter comes And there's no such thing as make-believe Puppy dogs, autumn leaves 'n' BB guns FADE God didn't make little green apples And it don't rain in Indianapolis
Lyrics by Bobby Russell. Recorded by Roger Miller (1968).
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