Wednesday, May 5, 2010

Poetry Wednesday: Listening...

I've been busy lately; moving, rushing, doing. My mind, too; racing, contemplating, creating. But stillness has been illusive...

Listening

Somehow, I must sit to listen.
Standing implies the readiness for action,
for the executing of the will.
To hear You I must sit down and calm down.

The magpie mind chatters.
It doesn't know about stopping.
How helpless I feel in its automatic firing,
its busy babbling. It is impossible to hear You
as long as I am full of sound.
I turn this helpless prayer toward You.
Help me to be quiet, to sit here
...slowly unknowing everything,
becoming dark, becoming yielding...
just sitting.

Here, without will, let me become willing.
Here, without concepts, help me to know.
Here, without doing, turn me toward usefulness.
Let my heart find its ears in You.
Let the countless cells of my body
open in order to listen,
Let my being come into Your presence
and experience the sound of Your light.
~Gunilla Norris~

Poetry Wednesday

5 comments:

Luke said...

This was beautiful? Is this typical of Gunilla Morris? Silence, openess, yearing, union........sublime!

Anonymous said...

I love this poem, Ruthie. Especially the image of the body's cells all opening to hear God. I'd never even heard of Gunilla Norris but now I'll keep my eyes peeled for more of her work. Nice to have you in on Poetry Wednesdays :)

M.

Ruthie said...

Yes, Luke! Gunilla Norris is a mystic poet. She's one of my favorites! :) I love this one.

Ruthie said...

Hi Marigold,

I stumbled upon Gunilla Norris a couple of years ago and fell instantly in love with her work. This poem is from a book called Being Home. Her poems are all this simplistic and meditative. This one is exactly what I needed this week.

Kris Livovich said...

"without doing, turn me toward usefulness" What a great line, and just what I need right now. Thank you for this addition .