They fought with God's cold—
And they could not and fell to the deck
(Crushed them) or water (and drowned them) or rolled
With the sea-romp over the wreck.
Night roared, with the heart-break hearing a heart-broke rabble,
The woman's wailing, the crying of child without check—
Till a lioness arose breasting the babble,
A prophetess towered in the tumult, a virginal tongue told.
Ah, touched in your bower of bone
Are you! turned for an exquisite smart,
Have you! make words break from me here all alone,
Do you!—mother of being in me, heart.
O unteachably after evil, but uttering truth,
Why, tears! is it? tears; such a melting, a madrigal start!
Never-eldering revel and river of youth,
What can it be, this glee? the good you have there of your own?
Sister, a sister calling
A master, her master and mine!—
And the inboard seas run swirling and hawling;
The rash smart sloggering brine
Blinds her; but she that weather sees one thing, one;
Has one fetch in her: she rears herself to divine
Ears, and the call of the tall nun
To the men in the tops and the tackle rode over the storm's brawling.
She was first of a five and came
Of a coifèd sisterhood.
(O Deutschland, double a desperate name!
O world wide of its good!
But Gertrude, lily, and Luther, are two of a town,
Christ's lily and beast of the waste wood:
From life's dawn it is drawn down,
Abel is Cain's brother and breasts they have sucked the same.)
Loathed for a love men knew in them,
Banned by the land of their birth,
Rhine refused them, Thames would ruin them;
Surf, snow, river and earth
Gnashed: but thou art above, thou Orion of light;
Thy unchancelling poising palms were weighing the worth,
Thou martyr-master: in thy sight
Storm flakes were scroll-leaved flowers, lily showers—sweet heaven was astrew in them.
Five! the finding and sake
And cipher of suffering Christ.
Mark, the mark is of man's make
And the word of it Sacrificed.
But he scores it in scarlet himself on his own bespoken,
Before-time-taken, dearest prizèd and priced—
Stigma, signal, cinquefoil token
For lettering of the lamb's fleece, ruddying of the rose-flake.
Joy fall to thee, father Francis,
Drawn to the Life that died;
With the gnarls of the nails in thee, niche of the lance, his
Lovescape crucified
And seal of his seraph-arrival! and these thy daughters
And five-livèd and leavèd favour and pride,
Are sisterly sealed in wild waters,
To bathe in his fall-gold mercies, to breathe in his all-fire glances.
A lioness arose. A prophetess towered in the tumult…
What can it be, this glee?
How can we possibly find the word “glee” in a story shrouded in such suffering?
In my last post, we talked about the power that can be found in suffering, if only we allow Christ to unlock it within us. With this power comes a joy that we must reflect on.
We need to think about what joy truly is, and how it can exist within sorrow.
John Paul II describes Mary, the Mother of God, as the ultimate model for suffering. He even states that her intense sufferings amassed, especially standing next to the cross, were “not only a proof of her unshakeable faith but also a contribution to the redemption of all” (Salvifici Doloris 25).
I have always thought about the presentation of Jesus in the temple, which is recognized by the Church as both a joyful mystery of the rosary and one of the seven sorrows of Mary.
That’s because joy is not the absence of suffering; it is the ability to turn to God’s love and let it consume us in the midst of suffering.
This is what the has been unlocked by the woman in the poem- this lioness and prophetess. A sister calling her Master, God above. One sister in a group of five nuns exiled from Germany in a time when Catholics were under attack. These five nuns stood in the storm as symbols of the five wounds of Christ with a surrender that mirrors the surrender of Our Lady.
In our lives, we must remember the call of the tall nun and the fiat of the Virgin Mary; we must make our own turn to joy amidst suffering.
What has been your definition of joy in the past? Have you ever thought about sorrow and joy coexisting before?
Love your quote about joy amidst the suffering, through turning to God, with the beautiful example of the Presentation being both a joyful mystery and one of the Our Lady of sorrows Chaplet. ❤️🙏🏻