Lent is a Poem

beauty, truth, goodness, and longing

What is the essence of poetry?

Longing.

I had a Catholic professor and mentor who taught that the essence of poetry is longing. He said that’s why Protestants made better poets. We are still filled with a longing for Christ’s presence, and we use our art to reach towards him, to express grief over his absence. Catholics, he explained, in contrast, believe in the full bodily presence of Christ in the Eucharist, so they have more of their longings met.

T.S. Eliot, one of my literary heroes, was a favorite example of this professor. Indeed, if you take the time to compare the poetry Eliot wrote as Anglican with the poetry he wrote as a Catholic, you’ll find some validity in the belief. ‘The Journey of the Wiseman’ is lackluster compared to ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.’ It seems his conversion stole much of his craft. Now, my professor was also quick to make the argument that Catholics made better novelists than Protestants, citing Flannery O’Conner and Evelyn Waugh as proof. His reasoning (and that of a few other Catholics I’ve known) is that this phenomena has to do with the Catholic understanding of ordo amoris “the ladder of love.” All novels are essentially journeys up and down this ladder, showing how every love ultimately finds order or disorder, is lost or gained, is worthwhile or not, in relation to how it either helps someone climb up or pulls them down this ladder, which reaches upwards, directly towards the heart of God. Even love for your dog, George Weigel explains, is a good thing, for it urges you to love its Creator. All earthly loves are meant to help us climb the next rung on the ladder. Even the basest loves are meant to show us the deficiencies in our own understanding of love, pointing us upwards to a truer, greater, lovelier image.¹

While the conversation of which tradition has the best poets and novelists is one I would cheerfully debate discuss over a cup of tea anytime - I’m not certain it can ever be fully settled. All I really know is that the essence of poetry is longing. And all the best stories have a love story (used in the broadest sense - not necessarily romantic love) that help us climb up the ladder of love.

There is no deeper longing than the longing between Christ and his bride. There is no greater love than the love between Christ and his bride.

Prufrock’s Protegee

How is everyone doing with their Lenten obligations?

I admit that I have struggled with mine some the past few weeks. And I am apt to continue struggling.

My desire to retrain my heart to “love good more than you fear evil” and to practice living in God’s love rather than fear… was… well…

It has encountered some challenges. Recently, Little Man and I had to face part of our past life, the life we still had in Dallas, a life that was decidedly not good. Since the autumn, I’ve been able to focus on building Little Man and I a new world, one full of hope and joy, and slow, careful recovery and growth. It’s been healing.

I was wildly unprepared for how this encounter with our past life would hurt. I was unprepared for Little Man to have sleep regressions, fight boundaries, and cling to me.

I was unprepared for the emotions and fears that it would raise in me. How I’d have nightmares again, how I’d struggle with eating and hydrating properly, how I’d struggle with stomach issues, after they’d been doing so well. How I’d feel panicky even around people I’m coming to care about deeply, unable to express just how badly everything hurt this week.

You are broken, broken beyond any hope of repair came the refrain whispered over me. A refrain so incredibly painful I found myself struggling to go to bed at night - doing anything from sweeping, to weeping, to packing part of my birth center bag, to watching old comforting TV shows, to avoid closing my eyes till I was absolutely about to collapse from exhaustion.

Of course, dear readers, this refrain is not, never has been, and never will be God’s refrain over me or you or anyone.

But I have felt like Prufrock -

But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed,

Though I have seen my head (grown slightly bald) brought in upon a platter,

I am no prophet — and here’s no great matter;

I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,

And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,

And in short, I was afraid.

In short, I have been afraid. It’s understandable, and even a gift in a way. The only way to heal is through processing these heart wounds, facing them, acknowledging them, sharing them with my nearest and dearest.

To be able to tell someone this is what happened, and this is what it did to me, and I thought it was okay or even my fault at the time, but when I think of it now I want to take my baby and flee to a convent under the cover of darkness. And have her respond that it was never okay, the desire for a convent is a somewhat understandable if not advisable response, and that healing will come.

thin hair and a bruised body

This week, I wish I could process and write a little bit more detailed account of my recent heart wounds, but alas, legalities being what they are - I can’t.

What can I share though?

Oh - that the last two years have been hard. The Prufrock poem reminded me of it. He fear over eating peaches, his fear of whispered words, his fear of his hair falling out… I feel it all. Felt it all while watching other women “come and go, talking of Michelangelo.” I started struggling with my health dramatically within a few months of Little Man’s birth. Panic attacks, GI issues, food sensitivities, etc. These health issues were greatly exacerbated by the narrative being spoken over me. I was eight months postpartum when my body began to collapse. My hair was fragile and brittle, falling out constantly. I don’t mean normal postpartum hair loss, no I’d already dealt with that, I mean a delicateness and sensitivity that made my scalp constantly hurt with the lightest touch, and large clumps come out anytime Little Man grasped it. I thought about cutting most of it off, but couldn’t find anyone Little Man trusted to watch him, so I just managed it the best I could. I have always bruised easily. But by eight months postpartum I couldn’t wear shorts because when I did, people stopped and stared in horror. I was so bruised that I literally looked like I was wearing very pale leopard print leggings. I was at a friend’s house, and took Little Man into the play room to nurse. I had to sit awkwardly on a low sofa, exposing my legs. Her mom came to check on me, took one look at my battered legs and went into full mother-mode. She demanded what doctors I had seen, pushed me to rest, wanted to wrap me up. It was s-mothering at its finest. I went to my doctors, and they began testing me for autoimmune diseases and cancer.

Yup - I was twenty seven years old, with an eight month old baby, and being tested for cancer because my health was so inexplicably bad. I did not have much support, as the person who should have supported me was emotionally unavailable, pursing different desires and dreams. Suffice to say - my living situation was not conducive to hope or healing.

By God’s mercy - it turned out to be some rare and very strange virus. It ravaged my body, destroyed my immune system, triggered significant weight loss, made my hair grown thin and fragile, wrecked my platelets, caused horrible fatigue, and then left after about two months. My doctor said she’d never seen anything quite like it. Even after the virus abated, my body struggled. A month before Little Man’s first birthday, I was almost hospitalized for dehydration and malnutrition. Thankfully, at the eleventh hour, my doctors tried another medicine and some different supplements. It stabilized me with a severely limited diet.

From January to May of last year, I clung to Little Man, nursing him still, even though my body was falling apart with the effort. I couldn’t bear to stop, couldn’t bear the thought of giving up that special relationship. I nursed Little Man and - miraculously supported by Christ - graduated with my MA in Linguistics and World Arts. We finally weaned in May, when he turned sixteen months old, after I graduated. I was able to gain a few pounds, but I struggled, oh so much. That summer, the safety of our home life disintegrated, my anxiety skyrocketed, my body couldn’t heal…

I was ravaged by illness. Broken by my own brokenness, the anxiety and fear that wouldn’t abate no matter how I earnestly I prayed or faithfully I sought counseling. Living in a home where someone had invited evil in, intimately in, made it impossible to find peace. My body knew it. Little Man knew it. He struggled with anger and anxiety, to the point I was consulting our pediatrician and begging for wisdom from every mature mother I knew.

And finally - it all reached a crisis where the only good and godly path before me was to take Little Man and flee. We fled before I even knew that I had another passenger journeying with us, safely and miraculously tucked into my womb. My doctors had said that with all my body had been through postpartum with Little Man, more children would be impossible for months or perhaps a year or more to come. They didn’t imagine that my body would be able to conceive a child, or carry it safely if conception did occur.

six months later

And that is where we were six months ago, in October of last year. That is what our little ragtag family of three - Little Man, Azalea Bloom, and I - were like when we crashed into the Texas Hill Country.

Life has been so much safer and sweeter since. It is hard to explain the comfort we have found in The Cottage of Windy Cedars, of having a quiet little home that feels safe. We deal with the occasional spider or scorpion, and our water system is haunted by my late grandfather who likes to make it go out when I’m in the shower - but there are no truly malevolent forces. My stomach issues are slowly improving, my diet is expanding. My anxiety is getting better as well. I still have rough days, and this has been a week or so of such rough days, but there are also good, sweet weeks.

I remember being surprised during a week in late January when I laughed and snuggled Little Man and spent time with family, and went to church, and just generally was happy. I couldn’t recall the last time I had laughed like that, couldn’t remember the last time I had felt peacefully happy.

Not that happiness is our end all be all. Like any emotion - it is not necessarily an indication of our spiritual or physical health. But if you haven’t experienced peaceful happiness in months, it’s worth an examination of your life. Emotions are given by God to help us become aware of ourselves, and our need for him, and are a clue about what our heart needs.

I have so many tender, precious moments from the first two years of Little Man’s life. Hundreds that I never want to forget. Being nap-trapped and looking at his precious face, his little squishy face. Giving him a bubble bath while listening to Ave Maria during his first Advent. Watching him crawl for the first time so he could reach the dog’s tail to slobber on it. Bouncing him on my hip as I presented a final project for a capstone course to the admiration of my professors. Introducing him to a dear mentor, a man whose fame in missionary translation circles is legendary. Wearing him while I helped unpack a friend’s apartment, him reaching for every item in every box. Him being my plus one to a wedding, falling asleep during the mother-son dance song, snuggling safe and warm against me.

These moments feel like poems though. As beautiful as they are, they are full of longing. Longing for a love I knew I never had completely, but entirely lost when I brought Little Man home from the hospital. Each tender moment is marked by a specter of absence, of something that wasn’t there. I see it even more so when I look at all the pictures of Little Man after he turned one. Almost all the photos are just of him and me, of the two of us. As the year marches towards October - there are only photos of him and me.

It was just the two of us, crafting a little poem, trying to snatch smidgeons of happiness amid our suffering. It hurts to remember.

I don’t hurt for what I have actually lost. It seems like nothing in comparison to all we have gained in this new home of ours. No - if I consider what I have actually lost it seems like the good loss of an amputation. Painful at first, but healing over time. To keep the infected limb a moment longer would have killed us all, and I would rather live the rest of my life without a leg than suffer with an infected one.

Rather- I hurt for what I know we were meant to have. I hurt to know that there should have been a ‘someone more’ in those photos. A someone who should have protected us, cherished us, wanted us.

But that someone doesn’t exist. The frame only ever contains a shy toddler and a sickly mother, looking out at the world with haunted eyes.

writing poems

There are times, amid the business of this season and the preparations of Azalea Bloom, that I can forget the hurt. Ignore the ache in Little Man’s eyes when we go to the park and he sees other little boys with their daddies, ignore the ache when I roll to the opposite side of my bed and find only toy trucks, sweetly left by Little Man to keep me company. I can ignore the poetic nature of Azalea Bloom’s movements. Ignore how each sweet kick and precious flutter writes a lament on the walls of my womb, grieving over how the movements of this babe will be the last I will ever feel.

I can even almost forget the actual suffering we endured.

But life, even the most celebratory one, is a poem. It is full of longing because Christ hasn’t returned, because there are so many things that are not yet well.

beautifully broken

One night recently was particularly hard. I sat in the armchair in the living, crying softly, while Little Man played on the floor nearby. I rested my head in my hands, aching and anxious.

Then, my generous, precious, sweet Little Man walked over, and put something in my lap. I didn’t look up at first. He patted my knee a moment, then went back to playing. When I looked up, I saw he had placed his favorite truck in my lap.

His little red firetruck.

He had sought to comfort me the best way he could, by sharing one of his most precious belongings. It was beautiful.

It reminded me of Christ. In Lent, we prepare to commemorate his sacrifice of love. We read Isaiah 53. We remember he was despised, rejected, wounded, bruised, oppressed, afflicted, stricken, cut off from the land of living.

He did all of this for us. He did this all for love. His life was a poem, one full of longing and passion for every soul that has ever existed. His body became a poem itself, detailing every kind of brokenness we could ever encounter.

It was broken. And it was still beautiful. In the deepest sense of beauty. A beauty that recognizes that there is a goodness and truth that goes deeper than anything we can comprehend is present.

It is the beauty of Michelangelo’s Pieta, where Mary cradles the broken, crushed, body of her son, whose breath has been wrenched from his lungs.

It is the beauty of a well-crafted poem, which expresses longing for all that is lost and broken, but in it very expression, suggests there might be something that can meet that longing.

a final invitation

Life is a poem, and one that has lines of lament. I’ll be sharing more about writing laments, which are prayers where we pour out our grief, heart wounds, and longings to God in a conference a week from tomorrow. It is called Beautifully Broken. It will be hosted by First Baptist Canyon Lake.² Below is the link to sign up. If you’re curious about what it means for God to redeem our brokenness, to find healing through his and our own scars - I encourage you to attend.

In the meantime, I ask for prayers in the coming week. We will have to deal with something from our past life not once, but twice, in the next eight days. Pray for my heart to be strong in spite of these encounters, pray for my energy and health as I prepare and present at the conference, pray for God’s peace to guard our cottage and our hearts and our minds, even our dog.

And just generally pray because my third trimester mood swings are intense.

Reasons I cried today:

-I was tired

-I was hungry

-I saw two Swedish Supermodels at Whole Foods, when I was having an I-look-like-a-deranged-person-smuggling-a-balloon-under-her-oversized-shirt day. I know I’m pregnant and old-ish at twenty-nine and not so cute-ish anymore after all my health issues, but still - I don’t like to be reminded of it when I am just trying to restock our stash of organic cheese sticks³

-I saw the CUTEST little cow, merrily munching grass

-Little Man threw a shovel of dirt in my lap after I specifically asked him NOT too

-Little Man looked up at me in delight as I sang the Doxology (probably off-key because I’m an arts consultant not an artist) before tucking him into bed

-God granted me favor with governmental powers and after fighting with them for six weeks over a clerical error they made - my health insurance has been reinstated

-I watched Cars with Little Man and the ending got to me

1. Weigel, George. 2015. “Letter Seven: Brideshead Revisited and The Ladder of Love.” In Letters to a Young Catholic.

2. You do not have to be a Baptist to attend the conference… or to speak at it apparently.

3. It is now well-known and well-documented to my family that I have a weekly meltdown at Whole Foods. So much so, that when I told my mother it was my city errand day, she wished me a ‘good Whole Foods meltdown’ while I was there.