To Suffer Damage

"When the Japanese mend broken objects they aggrandize the damage by filling the cracks with gold, because they believe that when something's suffered damage and has a history, it becomes more beautiful."

~ Barbara Bloom

Latest LOL

"If life gives you lemons, save the receipts."

~ Stephen Colbert

Latest LOL

"Take everything I say with a grain of salt, because my new sponsor ... is salt."

~ Stephen Colbert

Serenity

Not every boat you come across is one you have to take;
Sometimes standing still can be the best move you ever make.
~ Sarah Brightman

Romance on Psalm 137

St. John of the Cross wrote this in response to Psalm 137. My friend Frank sent it to me in response to a post I wrote on artifacts at the British Museum. There is a longing-for-home in this poem which speaks to my uprooted soul, although I am confused as to which home it is for which I am longing. Perhaps it's Home-with-a-capital-H that this poem speaks of, longed for in some way by all creatures.

By the rivers
of Babylon
I sat down weeping,
there on the ground.
And remembering you,
O Zion, whom I loved,
in that sweet memory
I wept even more.
I took off my feastday clothes
and put on my working ones;
I hung on the green willows
all the joy I had in song,
putting it aside for that
which I hoped for in you.
There love wounded me
and took away my heart.
I begged love to kill me
since it had so wounded me;
I threw myself in its fire
knowing it burned,
excusing now the young bird
that would die in the fire.
I was dying in myself,
breathing in you alone.
I died within myself for you
and for you I revived,
because the memory of you
gave life and took it away.
The strangers among whom
I was captive rejoiced;
they asked me to sing
what I sang in Zion:
Sing us a song from Zion,
let's hear how it sounds.
I said: How can I sing,
in a strange land where I weep
for Zion, sing of the happiness
that I had there?
I would be forgetting her
if I rejoiced in a strange land.
May the tongue I speak with
cling to my palate
if I forget you
in this land where I am.
Zion, by the green branches
Babylon holds out to me,
may my right hand be forgotten
(that I so loved when home in you)
if I do not remember you,
my greatest joy,
or celebrate one feastday,
or feast at all without you.
O Daughter of Babylon,
miserable and wretched!
Blessed is he
in whom I have trusted,
for he will punish you
as you have me;
and he will gather his little ones
and me, who wept because of you,
at the rock who is Christ
for whom I abandoned you.

EDITED TO ADD: The only part of the poem that rubs me the wrong way is that Babylon is personified as a "daughter" whom the poet asks God to punish. However, I do not hold this against St. John -- he was in a long line of saints and theologians who personfied Babylon as a female -- and I hope you don't either.

London 12/12

Each friend represents a world in us,

a world possibly not born until they arrive,

and it is only by this meeting that a new world is born.

- Anais Nin

I have blogged about Ancient Near Eastern tablets, flights over the Thames, movies, books and games. But for me, the best part of being in London one month ago was the renewing of friendships (not to mention meeting a few great new people too). In the end, that is what made my vacation a vacation. That is what infused me with energy upon my return, and inspired this series of 12 posts, which is now, finally, complete.