Fire, Rope and Bread

simplicity // 24
Fire, Rope and Bread

I was touched recently by the simple conviction of the poet Mary Oliver, and the metaphorical way she understands what she does. In an introduction to one of her books, she writes:

“Poetry is a life-cherishing force. And it requires a vision, a faith, to use an old-fashioned term. For poems are not words, after all, but fires for the cold, ropes let down to the lost, something as necessary as bread in the pockets of the hungry. Yes, indeed.”

Would that we could understand our life’s work with similar potency. But what’s stopping us? Surely it’s not just the poet who can express so vividly the gift that they bring to the world around them?

I love the culmination of Douglas Coupland’s recent novel, Player One: “Here’s a toast,” he writes, “to everyone on earth who’s ever been eager – no, desperate – for even the smallest sign that there exists something finer, larger, and more miraculous about our inner selves than we could have supposed.

“Here’s to all of us reaching out our hands to other people everywhere, reaching out to pull them from the icebergs on which they stand frozen, to pull them through the burning hoops of fire that frighten them, to help them climb over the brick walls that block their paths. Let us reach out to shock and captivate people into new ways of thinking.”

There is, I am sure, within every single one of us, a way of expressing our story that will help to release our imagination and to realise more fully our potential; a way that is not just “words, after all”, but fire, and rope, and bread.


* * *

action point:

Which metaphor(s) could you use to describe the gift you bring to the world around you?


* * *

rsvp:

“Having received your thought on silence this morning, I looked out my office window a tree which is bursting into a vivid display of green just outside. I reflected on the silence of the the tree - do I hear its cries of joy or pain? Does its silence have the presence of something which is not sound? It is planted there to be and to reflect the evolution of the seasons and the presence of God. How do we use our gift of active reflection to help us to find the same level of of stillness of heart?. For me today it is reflecting as I sit here observing the tree that I need to give time to being present to the same stillness that the tree lives and breathes each day” Ciaran

“Took a cue from ‘the Silence’ and didn’t turn on the radio or the television in the pre-school rush this morning... thereby meaning there was no pre-school rush. We all actually paid attention to each other, instead of a box...” Nev

“I am really struggling with this Lent series. Finding time to escape, to be silent, to just listen seems well-nigh impossible some days. This evening as I continue working I can hear three different televisions and someone on a phone. The noise is horrible and there is no hope of silence. But I am sure I am not the only person struggling. I know the wilderness was not a pleasant experience for Christ ; I think there must have been great silence but also the 'searing screams' of the devil tempting him, and I know he had difficulty at times escaping from the crowds and the noise, but he managed it. So he understands my frustrations. I want to learn to be more like him.” Barbara

“I am moving towards - finishing my book; other written reflections... And I have noticed that lots of words seem to want to gush out and that I enjoy playing with the words until they express something more than their face value. Like any artist, in any medium, the creative gift is to tell the story in such a way that this ‘something more than’ is passed from the writer to the reader...” Sandra

* * *

May you reach beyond “just words”, today.
Go well!

Brian