Poetry that makes you say, "Hmmm", part 3

This is the third and last in my series of wonderful and mind-bending poems that were selected by Andrew Imbrie for his Cantata, Adam. This music was performed by the Cantata Singers on November 10 of this year.

This is the fifth and final piece in Part I, and is the most direct about being intentionally confusing.

A God and Yet a Man?
A god and yet a man?
A maid and yet a mother?
Wit wonders what wit can
Conceive this or the other.
A god and can he die?
A dead man, can he live?
What wit can well reply?
That reason reason give?
God, truth itself, doth teach it.
Man's wit sinks too far under
By reason's power to reach it.
Believe and leave to wonder.

I love this stuff! For some reason, I find the fact that my mind is not capable of grasping the full nature and work of God to be delightful. I gave a talk at church about this early this year. It was basically a riff on how God's infinity trumps our ability to get to the bottom/top/end of things he as created. I had a ball giving it – it felt more like worship than much of anything else I have ever done.

Every once in a while, I wonder why I have such a visceral reaction to this sort of thing. I seriously get ga-ga over it! Something about my wanting a frontier that cannot be conquered. Similarly, I get really rebellious when faced with a systematic theology – any claim that the Church fully understands how we are to think about God and about ourselves in relation to God. I guess I was born to be a postmodernist, even though I was a little early. Or maybe a mystic, just a little late.

"Believe and leave to wonder"

Poetry that makes you say, "Hmmm", part 2

This is my second in the series on poetry my wife and I listened at a Cantata Singers concert in early November.

This is the third poem in the Andrew Imbrie's work, Adam. Like the first poem, this one is also by an unknown author, noted, for reasons beyond my ken, as Anon.

A Baby is Born
A baby is born us bliss to bring;
A maiden I heard lullay sing:
“Dear son, now leave thy weeping,
Thy father is the king of bliss.”
“Nay, dear mother, for you weep I not,
But for thinges that shall be wrought
Or that I have mankind i-bought:
Was there never pain like it iwis.”
“Peace, dear son, say thou me not so.
Alas! That I should see this woe:
It were to me great heaviness.”
“My handes, mother that ye now see,
They shall be nailed on a tree;
My feet, also, fastened shall be:
Full many shall weep that it shall see.”
“Alas! Dear son, sorrow now is my hap;
To see my child that sucks my pap
So ruthfully taken out of my lap:
It were to me great heaviness.”
“Also, mother, there shall a spear
My tendere heart all to-tear;
The blood shall cover my body there:
Great ruthe it shall be to see.”
“Ah! Dear son, that is a heavy case.
When Gabriel kneeled before my face
And said, 'Hail! Lady, full of grace.'
He never told me nothing of this.”
“Dear mother, peace, now I you pray,
And take no sorrow for that I say,
But sing this song, 'By, by, lullay,'
To drive away all heaviness.

My wife and I both had that “Oh!” reaction to Mary's lines:

“Ah! Dear son, that is a heavy case.
When Gabriel kneeled before my face
And said, 'Hail! Lady, full of grace.'
He never told me nothing of this.”

The juxtaposition of the crucifixion with the annunciation is powerful and true. Like when my sister gave me a copy of Elie Wiesel's Night for Christmas with the inscription “This is why Christmas was necessary.”

Poetry that makes you say, "Hmmm", part 1

My wife and I went to a concert by the Cantata Singers here in Boston last Friday. They did a couple of wonderful Bach cantatas wrapped around a modern work by Andrew Imbrie called Adam. This particular work starts with a series of medieval poems and three of them have real twists that got my attention.

Before I go further, though, I want to mention how great the music was. I don't know if it was me or the performers, but it seemed to me as if they were just so clear in their intent that even relatively poorly educated (musically, anyway) me could see where they were going. I often feel more like I'm watching a game without knowing any of the rules!

Anyway, here is the first movement's poem:

Adam Lay I-bounden
Adam lay i-bounden, bounden in a bond;
Foure thousand winter thought he not too long.
And all was for an apple, an apple that he took,
As clerkes finden written in theire book.
Ne hadde the apple taken been, the apple taken been,
Ne hadde never our Lady aye been Heaven's queen.
Blessed be the time that apple taken was,
Therefore we may singen, "Deo gracias!"

The author (anonymous or unknown) points out that without Adam's sin we wouldn't have had Mary becoming the Queen of Heaven (by being Jesus' mother). So we should be glad that Adam sinned. Huh? Like I said "....makes you say 'Hmmm''".

On the one side, Adam's sin sure has messed things up a bunch:

• Violence
• Injustice
• Death
  

...just to name a few things that we might want to have second thoughts about.

On the other, God loves us and accepts us as we are. We'd never know the depth of God's love without sin.

I'm just not sure I can get to the place where I can say, "Blessed be the day that apple taken was." More like, "Thank God the apple isn't where the story ends!"

In any case, "Deo Gracias!"