This is a poem dealing with an ambiguous asceticism…
On the one
hand, this asceticism is necessary; on the other, it is in danger of going too
far, of cutting off the very life it is attempting to heal. “My soul” is the
Self that is beyond the identity of “I”.
This poem is
from my recently-published collection Black
Sun: Poems 1965-1985 (Finishing Line Press, 2014) which can be purchased
here.
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| Photograph 'Dark River' by Ziut Klosinski |
The Meeting with God
I, who do
not know my own soul’s name
have already
seen her,
disguised as
the shadow of a river,
saying to
me:
“Cry as much
as you can
for you
cannot live another day
without meeting
God.
Your heart
cannot be broken more.”
When I came
back into the world
all those of
the world made me forget you,
saying that
I’d loved you more
than anyone
could love God;
God would
punish me, they all said,
by making me
love even more.
How can I
pretend not to know you
when I have
loved you since
before the
day I was born?
You are
among a new people.
And my soul
has come here
to help me
find you.
“Give up the
last thing you could own,”
she says,
“Take the
last bite of food out of
your mouth.
Give up this
life.”
Jennifer
Doane Upton was born in eastern Kentucky in 1947, and studied under Wendell
Berry at the University of Kentucky. In 1972 she moved to California where she
studied poetry with Jack Gilbert and Jack Marshall, and published in several
little magazines and anthologies. She has had a lifelong interest in the
mystical poetry of the world, and later in life developed an interest in
traditional metaphysics and comparative religion. In 2004 she returned to Kentucky
with her husband Charles. The following year, her book 'Dark Way to Paradise: Dante’s Inferno in Light of the Spiritual Path' was published by Sophia
Perennis. The present poem(s) are from her recently-published collection Black Sun: Poems 1965-1985 (Finishing
Line Press, 2014) which can be purchased here.
~If you are interested in seeing your poetry appear in this blog, or submitting a poem by a woman that has inspired you, please click here for submission guidelines. I greatly look forward to hearing from you!~
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