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Wordsworth wrote an endless poem in blank verse on” the growth of a poet’s mind.”  I shall attempt a more modest feat for a more distracted age: a blog, “Things which a Lifetime of Trying to Be a Poet has Taught Me.”

NOTE:  Starting in July, 2020, Dr. Williams’s poetry blog will  be moving to http://www.thefivepilgrims.com.  Watch for it there!

Plato started a conversation in The Republic that is still ongoing.  Fortunately for us, Sir Philip Sidney was one of the participants.

Plato

THE CHALLENGE OF “THE REPUBLIC”

Plato banned the Poets from his state,

Yet said, if one could make a sound defense

In lilting verse with cogent arguments

That they do more than merely imitate

An imitation and dissimulate,

He’d take them back again.  And ever since

Our best minds have been trying to convince

His cautious Guardians of their mistake.

 

Sir Philip Sidney laid a firm foundation

In his divine “Defense of Poesy”:

The Poet gives us Virtue’s exaltation

More strong than History or Philosophy,

Concretely shows through his imagination

Not just what is, but more:  what ought to be.

Sir Philip Sidney

Remember: for more poetry like this, order Dr. Williams’s collected poetry, Stars through the Clouds, 2^nd edition (Lantern Hollow Press, 2020) at https://smile.amazon.com/dp/173286800X?ref_=pe_3052080_397514860!  And look for Williams’ very latest books: Deeper Magic: The Theology behind the Writings of C. S. Lewis (Square Halo Books, 2016), An Encouraging Thought: The Christian Worldview in the Writings of L. R. R. Tolkien (Christian Publishing House, 2018), and The Young Christian’s Survival Guide: Common Questions Young Christians Are Asked about God, the Bible, and the Christian Faith Answered (Christian Publishing House, 2019)!  Order from the publisher or Amazon.

 

312

Wordsworth wrote an endless poem in blank verse on” the growth of a poet’s mind.”  I shall attempt a more modest feat for a more distracted age: a blog, “Things which a Lifetime of Trying to Be a Poet has Taught Me.”

NOTE:  Starting in July, 2020, Dr. Williams’s poetry blog will  be moving to http://www.thefivepilgrims.com.  Watch for it there!

From Jesus to the oral testimony about Him by His disciples to the faith once delivered to the saints to the written New Testament to the developed doctrine of the church encapsulated in the historic Creeds:  Was that an arbitrary process or an unbroken line of logical, faithful, and inevitable development?  The people who were there while it was happening thought it was the latter.   And so it seems to me.

The Council of Nicaea

ON TO NICAEA 

“ . . . fides quaerens intellectum.” –Anselm of Canterbury

 

From the first day the Gospel was proclaimed,

The passionate intellect was there, demanding,

Not proof—the Empty Tomb provided that—

But reasoned explanation that was aimed

At faith in search of fruitful understanding

For mindful worship, not for idle chat.

 

So the Apostles, sent to meet this need,

Defined with care the doctrine they were handing

To their disciples; they, to those who sat

At their feet.  Faithfully they sowed the Seed,

Watered, weeded, wept through heat and cold

(Scripture was the standard, guaranteed,

By which they worked as on the seasons rolled),

Until it brought forth light a hundred-fold,

A wholesome harvest on which yet we feed.

The climax of this process was the Creed.

Remember: for more poetry like this, order Dr. Williams’s collected poetry, Stars through the Clouds, 2^nd edition (Lantern Hollow Press, 2020) at https://smile.amazon.com/dp/173286800X?ref_=pe_3052080_397514860!  And look for Williams’ very latest books: Deeper Magic: The Theology behind the Writings of C. S. Lewis (Square Halo Books, 2016), An Encouraging Thought: The Christian Worldview in the Writings of L. R. R. Tolkien (Christian Publishing House, 2018), and The Young Christian’s Survival Guide: Common Questions Young Christians Are Asked about God, the Bible, and the Christian Faith Answered (Christian Publishing House, 2019)!  Order from the publisher or Amazon.

 

311

Wordsworth wrote an endless poem in blank verse on” the growth of a poet’s mind.”  I shall attempt a more modest feat for a more distracted age: a blog, “Things which a Lifetime of Trying to Be a Poet has Taught Me.”

“The Lady of Shalott”; “The Highwayman”;  “Come away, O human child / To the waters and the wild / With a fairy hand in hand, / For the world’s more full of weeping / Than ye can understand.”  Tennyson;  Noyes;  Yeats.  Never has there been a composer more talented at writing pertinent, poignant, and piercing musical commentary on texts of classical poetry.  This is my wholly inadequate tribute.

 

SONG

For Loreena McKenitt

From a voice as soft as silk, as strong as steel,

A swift melodic stream in which it would be bliss to drown

That soared aloft, then quavered in a Celtic cadence down

To a place below what we can think or feel.

 

But from that place both thought and feeling rose

To force their furious way back up and into consciousness.

And is this haunting tune a curse, or rather does it bless?

Such painful beauty, comforting, sharp blows!

 

And then it faded into air to leave

And aching emptiness until it could be heard again:

A longing for a place, a time—we know not where or when,

Which, though we can’t remember, yet we grieve.

 

How can you lose what you have not possessed?

It was a question that the music could not help but pose.

The notes just shrugged and shook their heads as if to say, “Who knows?”

But he who hears cannot refuse the quest.

 

A blessing it imposes and a burden it bestows,

And only in the journey is there rest.

 

Remember: for more poetry like this, order Dr. Williams’s collected poetry, Stars through the Clouds, 2^nd edition (Lantern Hollow Press, 2020) at https://smile.amazon.com/dp/173286800X?ref_=pe_3052080_397514860!  And look for Williams’ very latest books: Deeper Magic: The Theology behind the Writings of C. S. Lewis (Square Halo Books, 2016), An Encouraging Thought: The Christian Worldview in the Writings of L. R. R. Tolkien (Christian Publishing House, 2018), and The Young Christian’s Survival Guide: Common Questions Young Christians Are Asked about God, the Bible, and the Christian Faith Answered (Christian Publishing House, 2019)!  Order from the publisher or Amazon.

310

Wordsworth wrote an endless poem in blank verse on” the growth of a poet’s mind.”  I shall attempt a more modest feat for a more distracted age: a blog, “Things which a Lifetime of Trying to Be a Poet has Taught Me.”

The conversion of C. S. Lewis is one of the strangest—and most instructive—conversion stories in the long and glorious history of Christian conversion.  It deserves a villanelle.

C. S. Lewis

SEHNSUCHT II

God knows no shame in what He will employ

To win a wandering sinner back again.

Thus, C. S. Lewis was surprised by joy.

A childish garden made to be a toy

Of moss and twigs upon a biscuit tin?

God knows no shame in what He will employ.

The silly garden helped him to enjoy

The real ones, made him want to enter in.

Thus, C. S. Lewis was surprised by joy.

Not Athens (first), Jerusalem, or Troy,

But Squirrel Nutkin’s granary and bin?

God knows no shame in what He will employ.

When Balder the beautiful was dead, destroyed,

The voice that cried it came into his ken;

Thus, C. S. Lewis was surprised by joy.

But pagan legend!  Could that be the ploy?

Somewhere the path to Heaven must begin.

God knows no shame in what He will employ;

Thus, C. S. Lewis was surprised by joy.

Remember: for more poetry like this, order Dr. Williams’s collected poetry, Stars through the Clouds, 2^nd edition (Lantern Hollow Press, 2020) at https://smile.amazon.com/dp/173286800X?ref_=pe_3052080_397514860!  And look for Williams’ very latest books: Deeper Magic: The Theology behind the Writings of C. S. Lewis (Square Halo Books, 2016), An Encouraging Thought: The Christian Worldview in the Writings of L. R. R. Tolkien (Christian Publishing House, 2018), and The Young Christian’s Survival Guide: Common Questions Young Christians Are Asked about God, the Bible, and the Christian Faith Answered (Christian Publishing House, 2019)!  Order from the publisher or Amazon.

Donald T. Williams, PhD

309

Wordsworth wrote an endless poem in blank verse on” the growth of a poet’s mind.”  I shall attempt a more modest feat for a more distracted age: a blog, “Things which a Lifetime of Trying to Be a Poet has Taught Me.”

“Depend upon it, Sir,” Dr. Johnson declared, “A man who is tired of London is tired of life.”  He was right.

The New Globe Theater, Londond

CONNECTING FLIGHT

Heathrow, July, 2004

 

The list of things we could not do was hard

Enough to try the patience of a Job:

Shakespeare at the reconstructed Globe;

The rhythmic changing of the Palace Guard;

The Tower, residence of the ill-starred;

St. Paul’s, Westminster Abbey, cross and robe;

The British Museum, endlessly to probe

That monument to manuscript and shard.

 

A plane that came too late on the first day

And one that left too early on the next

Produced a situation that was rife

With disappointment—but what could we say?

Dr. Johnson would have known why we were vexed:

“A man who’s tired of London’s tired of life.”

Remember: for more poetry like this, order Dr. Williams’s collected poetry, Stars through the Clouds, 2^nd edition (Lantern Hollow Press, 2020) at https://smile.amazon.com/dp/173286800X?ref_=pe_3052080_397514860!