From Four Quartets
by T.S. Eliot
I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope
For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without love
For love would be love for the wrong thing; there is yet faith
But the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting.
Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought:
So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing.
And I Said To My Soul, Be Loud
by Christian Wiman
Madden me back to an afternoon
I carry in me
not like a wound
but like a will against a wound
Give me again enough man
to be the child
choosing my own annihilations
To make of this severed limb
a wand to conjure
a weapon to shatter
dark matter of the dirt daubers' nests
galaxies of glass
Whacking glints
bash-dancing on the cellar's fire
I am the sound the sun would make
if the sun could make a sound
and the gasp of rot
stabbed from the compost's lumpen living death
is me
O my life my war in a jar
I shake you and shake you
and may the best ant win
For I am come a whirlwind of wasted things
and will ride this tantrum back to God
until my fixed self, my fluorescent self
my grief-nibbling, unbewildered, wall-to-wall self
withers in me like a salted slug
Note: "And I Said To My Soul," by Christian Wiman, from Every Riven Thing (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, LLC).
Thanks for these. I know the Eliot but I have to admit to not having come across Christian Wiman before.
ReplyDeleteThanks, DOMINIC. I thought it was interesting to contrast Wiman's more aggressive approach to the soul with Eliot's penchant for stillness, waiting, and faith.
ReplyDeleteOh my George, the Wiman poem is absolutely wrenching. I am ever learning to opt for still over will - and the Wiman words tell me (once again) that is the way to go.
ReplyDeleteHope this post does not represent what you are wrestling with at the moment....
No, BONNIE, these are not issues I am wrestling with at the moment. I think of myself more in Eliot's terms, one who prefers to wait in stillness until the light breaks through and the dance begins. Although Wiman's language is quite magnificent, I do not see myself as a "whirlwind of wasted things" riding a "tantrum back to God." I find the comparisons, however, to be interesting, and that's the reason I decided to juxtapose these two poems.
ReplyDeleteI got tired just reading Wimen! I think I'll wait with Eliot.
ReplyDeleteYes, BARB. I, too, and inclined to go with Eliot, though I find the contrast between the two poems to be interesting.
ReplyDeleteWaiting and dancing are definitely more in my line than whirlwinds and tantrums:)
ReplyDeleteI agree with you entirely, ROWAN. Thanks for the comment.
ReplyDelete