What is all this Juice and Joy?

by Catherine A. (04/25/2013 00:56 am)

Yesterday I sat on the front lawn with my twin girls and we had a go at making dandelion chains. We twisted the green stems into loose knots, snapped and tugged, soft yellow heads bobbing. I watched my daughter’s fingers hook weeds, fumble and find, fascinated by her determination, comforted by her small body next to mine.

It was finally warm enough to sit outside. We let the sunshine seep into our bones. We didn’t speak. The moment was quiet, pleasant, and I felt mighty grateful for Spring.

I know our seasons differ around the globe, but the long-awaited turn from winter here, where skiers still dig into slopes and peaks are still cloaked in white, is cause to celebrate.

So, for your enjoyment –

Two poems.

A favorite from Hopkins. With his contrasting language, that both floats and anchors the poem, and makes us pause over the word, Christ.

Spring

By Gerard Manley Hopkins

Nothing is so beautiful as Spring –

When weeds, in wheels, shoot long and lovely and lush;

Thrush’s eggs look little low heavens, and thrush

Through the echoing timber does so rinse and wring

The ear, it strikes like lightnings to hear him sing;

The glassy peartree leaves and blooms, they brush

The descending blue; that blue is all in a rush

With richness; the racing lambs too have fair their fling.

What is all this juice and all this joy?

A strain of the earth’s sweet being in the beginning

In Eden garden. – Have, get, before it cloy,

Before it cloud, Christ, lord, and sour with sinning,

Innocent mind and Mayday in girl and boy,

Most, O maid’s child, thy choice and worthy the winning.

And this from a contemporary Mormon poet, Nancy Hanks Baird, Utah Poet of the Year (1996). I’ve been thinking lately about the healing presence of children. The way they comfort and renew us. Baird calls them “menders of the breach.” Her poem is also rich with contrast, but much more personal and tender.

On Dying Young in April (for Ellen)

By Nancy Hanks Baird

One hundred dollars worth of tulips

buried in the fall,

a pittance thrown at death’s rampage

cannot prevent this leaving.

An Easter wind rattles the trees,

thins the pallid sunlight,

cotton seeds collide randomly,

like one hundred peals of laughter.

The earth shudders, opens its clenched fingers

raises up the burning tulips.

If I could take your tired face in my hands,

whisper to the confusion in your eyes,

I would tell you, softer than the April wind,

more gentle than the cotton,

the secret for living and dying

is in the children.

Timid, bawdy, brave as the

first day of Spring,

sturdy as tulips, abandoned as the cotton,

sober and wise as angels,

they wake and sleep in wholeness.

If I could put my child in your arms,

lay her cheek against your breast,

pat your throat with her healing hand,

she could not cure what the disease has stolen,

but she would heal with her purity

the wounds.

So when earth wraps you in gentle arms,

lays you tenderly down in the tulips,

look for the children, menders of the breach.

Go in joy and wholeness

with the children.

Images you loved? Thoughts on Spring? How are children like Spring? How do you feel when Spring comes to you, no matter the season?

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