Darshan

Hello all!

A new poem for you today (more of Aaron’s epic to come, eventually), one born out of this ongoing revelation, for me, of midrash-ic poetry. I’m realizing that “Darshan” can mean a few things, in different religions, but it was first introduced to me as particularly Jewish, and related to the writing of midrash. The epigraph that I still haven’t decided on is this:

…an old and serious pleasure, the name of which is midrash. —David Curzon

The poet said it was a pleasure to wonder
at the Word—an ancient pleasure rabbis
(may I say) withered under—and so am I
(not a rabbi) weathered by the restless
text: an open sea on every page.
Serious pleasure he said it again, then left
a bit of silence wherein a mind might wander—
          Like learning how to dive without a splash?
          Like finally beating Dad at Who can hold
               their breath the longest?
          Like readiness, the hard-won know-how
               to quick-construct a raft
when stranded or stormed into
a story whose symbols mean nothing
to me—yet, the swell is such I wonder
if the Way is found by way
of sea-gone pleasure?

The final two sentences from Malcolm Guite’s foreword to my book, Under the Terebinth ~

The kind of faith that is on offer in this collection is not a series of proclamations but rather a wrestle with the angel, a wrestle that is sometimes a dance. And that of course is what poetry does best: Wrestling and Dancing.

I admit I cried when I read the foreword for the first time.

And here’s that other poem, from Under the Terebinth, titled “Finally a Poem about Boats and Storms and Jesus” ~

Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when published

I’ve tried to write it
before, but I get sucked out
and flipped around with every tide—
the rip current of the Apostles’
Creed wrests me way off
shore where any vessel I know
to clamber onto is full
of men with little faith—
I end up in the bow
without fail, frantic
for a pillow, believe that if
someone could just fall asleep (not me)
—find that much rest inside himself—
we might, I don’t know, catch 153
fish, or walk on water, maybe see
a ghost. I tend to beg
to be thrown overboard
but no one’s drawing straws;
they’re not afraid. And I am
not their prophet. So I roam
the open sea on every page.

Here we are when the book came out~

Further up & further in,

Anna