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Author Archives: maryfeatherstone
FLORENCE
FLORENCE
THE VOICE OF SILENCE
There is the silence of air and space
In which breathing is a momentous act
And contemplation stretches like a long beach in the sun
Of limitless horizons
There is the muffled deadness which descends
Like the padded ceiling of a too-small room
Left windowless to the imagination
Which can no longer sing
NAME
Your name weighs heavy on the tongue, some days
It has been taken hostage by a foreign power
And rendered unpronounceable
Light years away from those simple lines
Traced in Aramaic on red sand
That say, without pretension, ‘I am here’
NEW YEAR
This year
May we risk believing
That old bruised fruit
Can grow new skin
That the tables in our temples
Can be overturned
Dust shaken from rugs
Threadbare and worn
Their colour renewed
PRESENCE
Into the absence
Inert chaos of nil
A word falls
Fires the cosmos
With pure presence
Extracts from grey nonbeing
Energy of light
Divides it from the dark
Te Deum
My husband John has just finished composing a Te Deum in 12 movements, juxtaposing classical and contemporary modes. Over the months of hearing extracts of the text through the study wall, the music gradually coming into form around it, I’ve grown more familiar with it, and been asking myself how it computes with our times. InContinue reading “Te Deum”
NEW YEAR SPEED BUMP
I drag my case over the man-made border
Between one year and the next
A sleeping policeman
Lying in the road
Marks time in yellow and black
Opens an eye and speaks
DIEU-MOBILE
Dieu dit
J’en ai marre :
De plus en plus cons
Les hommes creusent la terre
En extraient la moelleMinent le sol sous leurs pieds
Il ne restera plus que des trous
Du gruyère d’ici peu.
Sabbatical Musings
SABBATICAL MUSINGS Based on reading books by Rowan Williams, Graham Tomlin, Richard Rohr, Susan Cain, and places and people visited. Much of my sabbatical reading turned out to be connected with issues of power, control, and vulnerability. Not surprising then, that I simply had to take a photo of this massive installation on a wallContinue reading “Sabbatical Musings”
Mud at the wall 