...absolutely nothing of value to say today. I'm tired. It's raining, which is nice. I didn't have the time or energy to shoot a photo today, so I'll use another or two from the retreat. Guess I'll get religious on y'all tonight.
My retreat reading material
I had never read The Imitation of Christ before. It's pretty powerful, but one must access it in metered doses. The book that is rocking my world right now, that dovetailed so perfectly with the themes of our retreat, is The Crime of Living Cautiously, by Luci Shaw. Just the title alone grabbed me. And the book is proving to be quite wonderful. I'll share with you a poem she includes, one by Richard Wilbur:
Anonymous as cherubs
Over the crib of God,
White seeds are floating
Out of my burst pod.
What power had I
Before I learned to yield?
Shatter me, great wind:
I shall possess the field.
Richard Wilbur
“Two Voices in a Meadow”
In About a Milkweed Pod
6 comments:
I don't know Luci Shaw's work, so I appreciate the recommendation. Sounds like it was a really good retreat. I must do something like that one of these days.
I love books and I love pictures of books too!
The milkweed pod poem is an great bonus.
That is a great title and a beautiful poem. The stack of books freaked me out a little, though. That many books to get through in a weekend? Oh yea, you were on a retreat. That was what you were supposed to be doing. Phew.
whatnow - i came to luci shaw through madeleine l'engle. this is only book of hers i've read so far, other than the ones she co-authored with madeleine.
gawdess - anything book-related, i adore. i've been pondering the milkweed poem for weeks now. it keeps taking on different meanings for me. (perhaps there's an essay there somewhere, waiting to be written.)
lomagirl - the stack of books was entirely voluntary. the only ones needed for the retreat were the prayerbook and the imitation of christ. but i'm a book fiend; and my dad was a boy scout so i believe in being prepared. i also have this theory about book timing, and i like to make multiple options available to myself so i can choose the right one when the time comes. i rather thought i'd be reading mary oliver, but instead the luci shaw book captured me, and i spent much of my unstructured time with it. it was delightful, and i journaled an awful lot -- more than in years.
i like to make multiple options available to myself so i can choose the right one when the time comes.
Exactly! I prefer always to have multiple reading options so that I can read whatever I'm in the mood for. This is why the pile of books by my bed is always on the verge of toppling over, and why D. and I can't seem to travel without an extra bag just for the books, most of which we know we won't read.
i'm late to respond, whatnow, but you and i apparently really *are* soulmates in many ways! i have two teetering piles by my bedside, which receive many deprecatory comments by partner-o-mine. and yes on the extra bag just for books, too! and yes, i don't end up reading most of them. but i'm a big subscriber to the "right time" theory -- when it's the right time for a book, i'll be possessed of a burning desire to read it, and it will be exactly the right time for it. that means, though, that sometimes i buy a book fully intending to read it soon, but then it's not the right time for weeks, months, even years. but i'm never sorry about that, because when i *do* read it, i realize how i've read it at just the perfect moment and why i wouldn't have been ready for it back when i first intended to read it.
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