25 December 2008

The Nativity (luke 2: 1-20)

by
john o' donohue


No man reaches when the moon touches a woman.
Even the moon leaves her when she opens
Deeper into the ripple in her womb
That encircles dark to become flesh and bone.

Someone is coming ashore inside her.
A face deciphers itself from water
And she curves around the gathering wave,
Opening to offer the life it craves.

In a corner stall of pilgrim strangers,
She falls and heaves, holding a tide of tears.
A red wire of pain feeds through every vein
Until night unweaves and the child reaches dawn.

Outside each other now, she sees him first.
Flesh of her flesh, her dreamt son safe on earth.


i offer the names and lives of all in need of your care this christmas, Lord. m, my friend, who struggles with her husband and family to care for their baby who cries in uncertain anguish in pain brought by cerebral palsy. another friend who has willed to love his father who lives daily with cancer. c, who is disappointed in not being able to conceive, her past haunting her newfound hope in you. still, i remember in faith the rest whose lives you delivered from harm with our prayers and brought relief and trust in their own time of dark tidings.

what does it mean for you, God to become Man? what does your own poverty reveal about the anguish we face? Lord, give us grace to see intimately, your place in our pain and suffering. Lord, may your humanity and providence bring deep peace and needed relief to the lives of your people who labour in tears to understand this imperfection, this mystery.

22 December 2008

a song by dan fogelberg

a song i would want to be played at the end of life...(my funeral in fact)...speaks for a space so wide it encompasses much of a journey i've shared and lived. a song sung for soldiers, teachers, friends, sons and fathers...here's a rare clip from fogelberg's concert. in a time when sophisticated remix and innovative music studios influence the making of music and 'britney-tunes' become a popular and forgettable fad, these bare compositions of soul withstand the test of time and continue to find anchor in other lives.




LEADER OF THE BAND by dan fogelberg

An only child
Alone and wild
A cabinet makers son
His hands were meant
For different work
And his heart was known
To none --
He left his home
And went his lone
And solitary way
And he gave to me
A gift I know I never
Can repay

A quiet man of music
Denied a simpler fate
He tried to be a soldier once
But his music wouldnt wait
He earned his love
Through discipline
A thundering, velvet hand
His gentle means of sculpting souls
Took me years to understand.

The leader of the band is tired
And his eyes are growing old
But his blood runs through
My instrument
And his song is in my soul --
My life has been a poor attempt
To imitate the man
Im just a living legacy
To the leader of the band.

My brothers lives were
Different
For they heard another call
One went to chicago
And the other to st. paul
And Im in colorado
When Im not in some hotel
Living out this life Ive chose
And come to know so well.

I thank you for the music
And your stories of the road
I thank you for the freedom
When it came my time to go --
I thank you for the kindness
And the times when you got tough
And, pap, I dont think i
Said i love you near enough --

The leader of the band is tired
And his eyes are growing old
But his blood runs through
My instrument
And his song is in my soul --
My life has been a poor attempt
To imitate the man
Im just a living legacy
To the leader of the band
I am the living legacy
To the leader of the band.

bid a heart to follow

the rare theme song from the tv series 'beauty and the beast', first sung in 1987... retrieved, after years of seeking, thanks to utube. the lines from one of my favourite poems by ee cummings are interspersed within the lyrics;
sensing rain in a land of risk, trust and grief. the rich uncertainty of humanity taken afar by loss, and restored by love.

the same song is used to accompany a fitting & sensitive montage from Disney's cartoon version...