God With Us

     Here, some poems from different sources, times and perspectives, but with common or related experiential understandings. But they are limited to the reference points and lexicon of their place and time for words to express them.

W.H Auden

(from Anthem)

Let us praise our Maker, with true passion extol Him.

Let the whole creation give out another sweetness,

Nicer in the nostrils, a novel fragrance

From cleansed occasions in accord together

As one feeling fabric, all flushed and intact,

Phenomena and numbers announcing in one

Multitudinous ecumenical song

Their grand giveness of gratitude and joy,

Peaceable and plural, their positive truth

An authoritative This, an unthreatened Now

When, in love and in laughter, each lives itself,

For, united by His Word, cognition and power,

System and Order, are a single glory,

And the pattern is complex, their places safe.

Walt Whitman

(from To See God)

Why should I wish to see God better than this day?

I see something of God each hour of the twenty four,
and each moment then,

In the faces of men and women I see God
and in my own face in the glass,

I see letters from God dropped in the street,
and every one is signed by God's name.


Emily Bronte
(from Last Lines)

No coward soul is mine,

No trembler in the world's storm-troubled sphere:

I see heaven's glories shine,

And faith shines equal, arming me from fear.

Oh God within my breast,

Almighty, ever-present Deity!

Life--that in me has rest,

As I--undying Life--have power in thee!

...

With wide-embracing love

Thy Spirit animates eternal years,

Pervades and broods above,

Changes, sustains, dissolves, creates, and rears.

Though earth and man were gone,

And suns and universes ceased to be,

And Thou were left alone,

Every existence would exist in thee.

There is not room for Death,

Nor atom that his might could render void:

Thou--THOU are Being and Breath,

And what THOU art may never be destroy'd.


David
(from Psalm 139)

O Lord, you have searched me and known me.
You know when I sit down and when I rise up;
You understand my thoughts from afar.

You scrutinize my path and my lying down,
And are intimately aquainted with all my ways.
Even before there is a word on my tongue,
Behold, O Lord, you know it all.

You enclosed me behind and before,
And laid your hand upon me.
Such knowledge is too wonderful for me;
It is too high, I cannot attain to it...

For you did form my inward parts;
You did weave me in my mothers womb.
I will give thanks to You,
for I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
Wonderful are Your works,
And my soul knows it very well...

Your eyes have seen my unformed substance;
And in Your book they were all written,
The days that were ordained for me,
When as yet there was not one of them.


San Juan de la Cruz (St. John of the Cross)
(from The Spiritual Canticle)

Where have you hidden,

Beloved, and left me moaning?

You fled like the stag after wounding me;

I went out calling for you, but you were gone...

Seeking my Love

I will head for the mountains and for the watersides,

I will not gather flowers, nor fear wild beasts;

I will go beyond strong men and frontiers...

Why since you wounded this heart,

don't you heal it?

And why, since you stole it from me, do you leave it so,

and fail to carry off what you have stolen?

...

In the inner wine cellar

I drank of my Beloved, and when I went abroad

through all this valley,

I no longer knew anything,

and lost the flock that I was following.

There He gave me His breast;

there He taught me a sweet and living knowledge;

and I gave myself to Him, keeping nothing back;

and their I promised to be His bride.

My whole soul has now surrendered

With all its gifts to his dominion.

I have no flock to tend

Nor any other preoccupation,

For His love alone is now my occupation.


Rumi
(from The Religion of Love)

The sect of lovers is distinct from all others;

Lovers have a religion and faith of their own.

Though the ruby has no stamp, what matters it?

Love is fearless in the midst of the sea of fear.


Hafiz
(from Carrying God)

No one can keep us from carrying God

Wherever we go.

No one can rob His Name

From our hearts as we try to relinquish our fears

And at last stand, victorious.

We do not have to leave Him in the mosque

Or church alone at night;

We do not have to be jealous of tales of saints

Or those glorious, intoxicated souls

Who can make outrageous love with the Friend.

We do not have to be envious of our spirit's ability

Which can sometimes touch God in a dream.

Our yearning eyes, our warmth-needing bodies,

Can all be drenched in contentment

And Light.

No one anywhere can keep us

From carrying the Beloved wherever we go.

No one can rob His precious Name

From the rhythm of my heart, my steps and my breath.


Jesus
(from The Gospel of John)

Abide in me, and I in you...

Just as the Father has loved Me,

I have love you;

Abide in that love...

If you keep My commandments,

you will abide in My love;

just as I have kept the Father's commandments,

and abide in His Love.

This is My commandment:

that you love one another,

just as I have loved you.


The Apostle Paul
(from Galatians 2 & Collosians 3)

...I died to the law

that I might live to God.

I have been crucified with Christ;

and it is no longer I who live,

but Christ who lives in me.

And the life I now live,

I live by faith in [Christ]...

If then, you have been raised up with Christ,

keep seeking the things above, where Christ is...

For you have died,

and your life is hidden with Christ

in God.

First edited September 2010