logo
 
back
e-mail us
 

POETRY


Advent Longing

Advent longing
beats in my heart
like the longing
of an expectant mother
who waits for a
face-to-face encounter
with the child within.

So I yearn for the birth
of a new child of grace
in me.

Then in the dark silence
an encounter takes place
heart-side within.

Listening I hear,
“be my Christ-mass
you will see me
be born
be sent.”

-- Sr. Christa Cunningham, OP
St. Augustine, Fla.


Emmanuel

Softly,
like the wisp of a breeze
on a warm spring morning,
Silently,
like the settling of snow
on a crisp winter night,
Simply,
like the meadowlark’s song
on a lazy June afternoon,
You settle in our hearts,
Singular in your quest …
to bear us back
to God.

Come, Lord Jesus, Come.

-- Sr. Diana Seago, OSB
Atchison, Kan.


Mary’s Mass

“Yes,” Mary said to the Angel,
And the Word became Flesh.
Placing her hand on the altar of her body
On Jesus within, Mary said,
“His is my body, His is my blood.”
Mary’s Mass.
The Word of God takes Flesh,
Mary’s Mass, the Incarnation.
“Be it done unto me according to Thy Word.”
“No!” Mary humbly said, “Be it done unto
THEE according to MY word!”
This is my body, this is my blood!
And the Word was made Flesh.
Mary’s Mass.

-- Bruce Snowden
Brunswick, Ga.


God with Us

If Jesus born of Mary shows us God
most clearly (if the baby Jesus, in
some real sense, is God), then a child is God
and we can see God by watching children.
But Shakespeare’s “mewing, puking infant” does
not seem especially Godlike. … Babies need
a lot of care (at both ends). A child is
dependent, weak, dumb and quite full of greed.
So if our God is like a child, we then
must be adults: responsible, aware --
and work to feed, to clothe, to teach, to clean,
to love unconditionally, to share
ourselves. Imagine! Not a king, or wild
avenging warrior, but (my God!) a child…

-- Steven Shoemaker
Champaign, Ill.


Covenant

The
world
is
still
wounded --

one
long
jagged
scar

throbbing.

And yet --
this blessing.

This amazing
luminous
continual
blessing

in the shape
of
a baby

comes to
us
each year.

Comes
quietly,
in the midst
of winter

when all seems
barren and
dead

bringing
the promise
of our
deepest
life.

-- Christine Rodgers
San Francisco


2001 in Poetry

2000 in Poetry

1999 in Poetry

Poems should be previously unpublished and limited to about 50 lines and preferably typed. Please send poems to NCR POETRY, 115 E. Armour Blvd., Kansas City MO 64111-1203. Or via e-mail to poetry@natcath.org or fax (816) 968-2280. Please include your street address, city, state, zip and daytime telephone number. NCR offers a small payment for poems we publish, so please include your Social Security number.

National Catholic Reporter, December 21, 2001