Wednesday, January 21, 2015

january


This month has given us very cold days and now today I hung
my laundry outside: 2 loads. All dried. The sun is making shadows
 very low now in the shadows. It is waking up the other side of the
world. 

I opened a few windows to bring fresh air into the house.



from dailydoseofstuf tumblr

This is a rather long poem by Luci Shaw about the thaw
of January. I read this morning a good sentence about
poetry by CS Lewis in Reflections of the Psalms: 

For poetry too is a little incarnation, giving body to what has been
before invisible and in audible. 

Psalm for the January Thaw
Blessed be God for thaw, for the clear drops
that fall, one by one, like clocks ticking, from
the icicles along the eaves. For shift and shrinkage,
including the soggy gray mess on the deck
like an abandoned mattress that has
lost its inner spring. For the gurgle
of gutters, for snow melting underfoot when I
step off the porch. For slush. For the glisten
on the sidewalk that only wets the foot sole
and doesn't send me slithering. Everything
is alert to this melting, the slow flow of it,
the declaration of intent, the liquidation.

Glory be to God for changes. For bulbs
breaking the darkness with their green beaks.
For moles and moths and velvet green moss
waiting to fill the driveway cracks. For the way
the sun pierces the window minutes earlier each day.
For earthquakes and tectonic plates-earth's bump
and grind-and new mountains pushing up
like teeth in a one-year-old. For melodrama—
lightning on the sky stage, and the burst of applause
that follows. Praise him for day and night, and light
switches by the door. For seasons, for cycles
and bicycles, for whales and waterspouts,
for watersheds and waterfalls and waking
and the letter W, for the waxing and waning
of weather so that we never get complacent. For all
the world, and for the way it twirls on its axis
like an exotic dancer. For the north pole and the
south pole and the equator and everything between.

       by Luci Shaw


4 comments:

beth said...

"...For seasons, for cycles
and bicycles..."

Yep, that's what I'm praising Him for today. And for a husband with a shirt that says "enjoy the ride" on the back that I see as I pedal hard behind him; for horses happy in a sunny pasture and quiet country roads; for hills, up and down, and gears and brakes; for a tailwind and a cold drink from the fridge when I get home.

Thanks for sharing Luci Shaw. Love to you, Bonnie.

melissa said...

That's just beautiful. :)

Bonnie said...

Thanks Beth and Melissa.
I had my students write their own stanza. Need to write mine! One student has sent poems to Luci and yes, Luci
wrote her back.

podso said...

That's cool that your students added stanzas and sent them to Luci--snail or email? I guess we are not the only ones with a January Thaw. Seems we have one every January.