Francis Thompson: The Kingdom of God

O WORLD invisible, we view thee,
O world intangible, we touch thee,
O world unknowable, we know thee,
Inapprehensible, we clutch thee!
Does the fish soar to find the ocean,	5
The eagle plunge to find the air—
That we ask of the stars in motion
If they have rumour of thee there?
Not where the wheeling systems darken,
And our benumbed conceiving soars!—	10
The drift of pinions, would we hearken,
Beats at our own clay-shuttered doors.
The angels keep their ancient places;—
Turn but a stone, and start a wing!
‘Tis ye, ‘tis your estrangèd faces,	15
That miss the many-splendoured thing.
But (when so sad thou canst not sadder)
Cry;—and upon thy so sore loss
Shall shine the traffic of Jacob’s ladder
Pitched betwixt Heaven and Charing Cross.	20
Yea, in the night, my Soul, my daughter,
Cry,—clinging Heaven by the hems;
And lo, Christ walking on the water
Not of Gennesareth, but Thames!

Summer Dress.

The summer dress, 
Once verdant,
Now lies about the ankles 
And across the forest floor.
Glory has been shed, laid down, 
But not the majesty. 
The form now revealed in the absence 
Of it's outer garments,
 Is a breathtaking and bare structure.  
The whimsy of the green, then red, then gold now gone, 
We can see in full view, the bones that endure.  
Now, another ring about it's trunk, 
Leaves not just dying, but sacrificing, 
Pouring their remaining life back into the bark,
The capillary course having executed a full reverse 
So that another four seasons may be survived.  
In every season, no matter what it be, 
I know I shall never write the beauty of a tree.

G. M. Hopkins: Morning, Midday and Evening Sacrifice

THE DAPPLED die-away
Cheek and wimpled lip,
The gold-wisp, the airy-grey
Eye, all in fellowship—
This, all this beauty blooming,	5
This, all this freshness fuming,
Give God while worth consuming.
Both thought and thew now bolder
And told by Nature: Tower;
Head, heart, hand, heel, and shoulder	10
That beat and breathe in power—
This pride of prime’s enjoyment
Take as for tool, not toy meant
And hold at Christ’s employment.
The vault and scope and schooling	15
And mastery in the mind,
In silk-ash kept from cooling,
And ripest under rind—
What life half lifts the latch of,
What hell stalks towards the snatch of,	20
Your offering, with despatch, of!

Compelling.

Beauty compels. To stand in front of art and marvel at the craft, eventually you are compelled to consider the artist. To listen to a composition and be moved by a melody, eventually you are intrigued by the composer. We think about these creators, these human replicators of beauty (and sorrow) and we wonder what they are like, how they were shaped to be able to make us feel by their work. We give praise where it is due. But we do not praise the canvas, as marvelous as it is. We do not praise the percussion of sound waves, as miraculous as they are. We rightly praise the author, and wonder at who they are because of what they have done. It should be the same for the universe and for the miracle of life. Science is the canvas, impartial and in no need of assigning praise. That doesn't make science an enemy, it makes it exactly what it has always been: a tool. The coldness or sterility of a museum or concert hall does not diminish the emotions of the observer. And that is our place, one we cannot escape, no matter how we try to either put ourselves at the center of everything or remove ourselves completely, we are made as witnesses to the universe. And when we look, with pure observation or science, we should be compelled to ask, not what is color or what is sound, but instead and eventually ask "Who is the author? "

Pine.

A Scotch Pine grows,
It's backside haunted by phantom, forgotten limbs.
Malnourished, it is
Stunted, but well over two stories.
The broken bits of the backside, the Northside
Look like the spindle of a music box drum,
Abrupt and severe stumps
Sticking out from the cylinder.

A White Pine, A cousin
Straight, tall and symmetrical,
Dominates the space
In which both trees stand.
This pine is well ordered and green,
It's branches grow at proper fractal-ed intervals,
To maximize
The sun and soil and space.

A Sycamore branch
Imposes itself from afar.
The bully intercepts a shaft of light.
The Sycamore stands proud, arms open
The pine sulks and searches for the sun.
Eclipsed, options are removed,
The path to sunlight
Repeatedly obstructed.

The dwarfed Scotch
Grows in this territory,
In the constant state of seeking permission,
Suffering from some spine disorder,
It's trunk and limbs reacting
To circumstances that have shaped it's life.
Still a short life,
Still less than half a century.

My Scotch Pine,
Still a young man,
But withered and sparse
Like the aged,
He is contorted.
He leans his brittle shoulder
Against the firmness of the White Pine,
Reaching under and out,
Scooping his arms
Out and around the shade of the Sycamore,
Shedding needles and limbs
He could no longer sustain.
The offering of branches seems impossible.
Yet, they find pasture,
An open field of light.
The bristled back of the Northside
Strains to support the ambitions of the under-branches
That bend down
And then surge up into the sunlight.

Deep rooted,
Flexible but immovable,
The trees have no choice but to obey.
They surrender to the direction of the light.
And to the rain,
And to the persistence of the seasons.
The White Pine,
Given good position,
Grows strong and straight.
The Sycamore,
Here longer than all the others,
Has reached out,
Above the canopy,
Having survived the uncertainty of it's youth.
Towering above all:
It's great advantage.

The Scotch Pine,
Not beautiful,
Not true to it's form,
But still here.
Like the others,
It remains obedient to the light.
Free will is not an option,
For to choose anything other
Than the sun is to die.
The Northside
Provides a constant, present reminder,
Of death.
The Southside branches,
Those that persevere,
Provide a glimpse of hope.

My will,
At times immovable,
At times bent, near broke,
At times unyielding to anything,
Rebelling against the very Grace
That falls like rain,
That comes like sunshine.
My will is an unruly and unpredictable branch,
Seeking warmth in fire
Instead of the sun.

But the sun and the cycles remain,
Waiting to bless me,
Should I find the wisdom to yield,
Or to yearn,
Or to make my way
Out of the bed of dead needles
And into the light.
A tree has no will
But to seek the sun.
I have no will
But my own,
Unless I give it away,
To seek that which made me.
He who made me.
To seek the Light,
To find the Son.

The Branch.

I've borrowed an analogy from Tim Keller, who I believe borrowed it from someone else.  The thought is of a Branch that is perched on the edge of a cliff.  The situation is our fall from that cliff.  The concept is of Faith.  Our fall from that cliff, whatever metaphorical fall it may be, produces a desperation.  The desperate have an amazing capacity for Faith, especially when all other options are taken away.  God's pursuit of his people is a mysterious gift.  The pursuit, however, can feel like a chase by the Hound of Heaven, and indeed chase us right off the cliff into despair, into desperation.  If we are unable to stop and receive the pursuer, he will present another option.  It is the branch.  Falling from the cliff to our death, the branch need not be sturdy for us to trust it.  In the fall we have not the capacity or luxury of evaluating the branch before us.  There is mercy in it being our only option.  The only thing the branch needs to be is near, for us to reach out for it.  No matter the process of arriving at faith, whether it be strength or weakness, no matter what size or conviction of our faith, it does not matter.  Indeed, we only need a mustard seed of desperate faith to save, because it is not the faith that really saves, it is the object of faith that saves.  It may take wild circumstances for me to reach out for that branch, hoping in faith to be saved, but ultimately it is the goodness of the branch itself that saves.  This root in Abraham, this branch of Jesse, the one true vine in Christ Jesus.

In the story of the Bleeding Woman in Luke 8.42 we learn about the woman who tried for years to be healed.  "43 And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years,[a]but no one could heal her."
She had reached desperation.  And truly for this "unclean" woman to reach out and touch a rabbi is evidence of her desperation. But she also had faith.  It was only when she put that faith in action to the one that deserved that faith that she was healed.  She trusted fully in Jesus, without really being aware.  And her faith was rewarded.  What is more amazing is not the healing, but that Jesus then identified her.  She was hoping to remain unnoticed.  But Jesus made sure that she knew that he knew and now she not only had healing, but she had a savior.

We may reach out in desperate faith for the branch, hoping to be saved from our immediate circumstances.  What we get is so much more, Faith and Salvation on his glorious and eternal terms instead of our own.  All the power of the universe coming to bare on our individual hearts.

Deserved Love.

Pure Love is an unyielding Light, at times hard to take.  Our hearts cry out all of our lives, "I deserve to be loved!"  However, once we begin to be loved well, our hearts despair, "I don't deserve this love!"  In that is the beginning of our true identity, a noble and good fear and a realization of the power and nature of a Pure Love.  We begin to realize that the reasons we feel like we don't deserve the goodness are unfounded and the reasons we feel like we do deserve it are not what we once thought.  It's not about us.  God is Love and we get access to his love because of who he is, not because of who we are.  And better yet, the who we are doesn't count against us.

Pure Love is an unyielding Light and will not tolerate darkness.  If we have things we wish to remain hidden, Love can become an interrogation.  But once we accept our identity of a Child of God, the light no longer burns, but instead gives life.  This is the beginning of True Love, his Love that fuels all other good love.