Curious Conundrums for the Month of July...

Good day to you!  Whilst my longer projects are still in a not-quite-finished state, here are some riddles to tease your wits as you while away the fair summer months.  Good guessing to you!  (Answers, as is customary, may be found on the "Answers" page above.)

1K.
I am not

And I will not be

I was

Before you were

No day dawns

Upon my watch

Nor future

Can occur

What am I?

2K.
Dimmed by daylight

Brightened by dark

Multiplied by division

Enlarged by destruction

What am I?

Midsummer Musings or That Which Is To Come

Well met and good greetings to you!  I fear this is an inexcusably short offering given the now (regrettably) expansive time gap betwixt when I last posted and the present; however, I am afraid I am moving into an ever-busier stage of life, and sometimes I am inattentive to my authorial duties.  That said, I do have some longer and (perhaps) more interesting pieces in the works, several of which I hope to post within the next month or two.  In the meantime, then, I hope you will enjoy what follows -- ! 

+JMJ

Last Thoughts

By Caitlin Clancy

Copyright 2014

Worlds meeting

Death’s greeting

Time’s fleeting

Kiss farewell

Ember sky

Mountains cry

Haildrops fly

Touch the dark

Wondering

Pondering

Thundering

In a cave

Who was I?

Where will I…?

Let me die –

Here be still. *

* N.b. To nip possible confusion in the bud: it has become apparent to me that there seems to be something of a fad in the literary world of late which likes to interpret modern poems in the most depressing and morbid light possible.  Though I know you, gentle reader, are surely a cut above the average, still I feel it necessary to mention that this poem is not in any way about suicide.  End disclaimer. 

Night in Heorot

Good Tidings to you, and a very blessed and holy Lent!

I have today a poem for you that I wrote not too terribly long ago, but which seemed appropriate both to fill the void in my rather sporadic posting and also to acknowledge this penitential season. (As to the latter - can you guess why?  Read it and see if you can decipher what I refer to!  ... And yes, I am incorrigible when it comes to riddles.  I turn everything into riddles.  Come to think of it, I am a riddle... but that subject I shall leave be as potential fodder for another post.)  

Happy reading, then, and God be with ye! 

+JMJ

Night in Heorot

By Caitlin Clancy

Copyright 2013

“About times and dates, brothers, there is no need to write to you for you are well aware in any case that the Day of the Lord is going to come like a thief in the night. It is when people are saying, 'How quiet and peaceful it is' that sudden destruction falls on them, as suddenly as labour pains come on a pregnant woman; and there is no escape.”

–      I Thessalonians 5:1-3[1]

In a bygone age, our schoolboys read,

Good Hrothgar drunk his mead;

Beowulf rent mad Grendel’s arm

And gold was sowed like seed

In long-gone years we waged our fight

With battlements and spears,

But now we, spent, are moved to write

And war with unshed tears

The doom,

The doom,

The doom of our time

Is knocking at the gates –

And woe to the one who heeds not the war

And woe to the one who casts open the door

And fool be the one who tries to ignore

The flame-sword that God creates[2]

No fanfare greets the suited man

Who, nervous, tugs his tie;

No horn is blown for skirmish unknown

Where boys, silent, bleed and die –

Before the walls that never were,

But here that ought have been,

Under the red of a flashing sign

Behold the carrion birds again

And souls that learned not to cry

The doom,

The doom,

The doom of our time

Is found at the heart of the home:

It festers in the deep of a look

It billows large from the thoughts of a book

Its meaning moves with the castle-rook

Or the words soft-read from the tome

Though no sorcerer here

His magic works and

No dragon his fire blasts,

Yet some of the waves upon the earth

Come not out of the sea

And some of the ones who rise and walk

Are born unnaturally

And some still lurk in the close–cropped verge

And eye those going past –

Yea, and behold, the monsters still rise

From up out of the grass!

The doom,

The doom,

The doom of our time

Comes not in battle array

It looks not to put upon hearts its fear

Nor seeks to make stallions charge back and rear

And tears not from mothers a wishful tear

But rends us now twain with cold thoughtless steel

Swung silent in the fray

Listener, be watchful; take back with you

This caution, this thought, this word –

That not all you feel and think and do

Is distant from what you have heard

Remember that good gold given well

Can snatch a soul from the depths of hell

Remember that fealty to one’s lord

Has worth above the dark world’s fjord

Remember the fate of Volsung’s young           

And that some deeds are best left unsung

And, above all, by our God who forgives,

Remember, remember that Grendel lives!

---

[1] http://www.catholic.org/bible/

[2] Reference to Genesis.  A fool is he who tries to reenter Eden against the command of God.

Red Courage

There is not much to say about this post, so I will let it speak for itself.

God bless!
Caitliceach Cailín

Red Courage

By Caitlin Clancy

Copyright 2014

You barely remembered

The shrapnel

Or how the shell

Found your side

All you knew

Was the sickening stab

Of the thought

That they all had died

And that moment

When you would

Beg them

To leave you lying there

To leave you lying there

To let you go from where

The cannons

And the rifles blare

To leave you lying there

To let you go from there,

With the smoky,

Bleeding air;

To leave you lying there.

Then amid the muzzles’ flash

Bright and quick

You saw her sash

Dancing in light

You heard your child call

In a voice

So very small

‘Don’t leave me lonely here’

Don’t leave me lonely here

Don’t leave me lonely here

Was ever a cry so dear?

Don’t leave me lonely here!

Pain gushing

From your side

You saw Him

Who made the world His Bride

Your own dark crimson tide

Beside that ocean

Seemed

To ebb –

I won't leave you lonely, dear,

Let me come to dry your tear,

Don’t leave me lying here –

This life also is of God.

February Flutterings: St. Valentine's Day and Norse Poetry

Greetings, my friends!

I meant to post nearly two weeks ago now, but was interrupted and, regrettably, forgot to return and post what I had intended!  My apologies for the omission.  

The poem I have selected for today is, I believe, in the spirit of St. Valentine's Day, though not in the Hallmark sense.  Rather, I take it to be more in the spirit of faith, sacrifice, and martyrdom - after all, St. Valentine was such a one, and the true love he exemplified (and which can also be seen in all loves: married, dating, or simply the love between friends) must of necessity be sacrificial love if it is to be in any sense real. (I will spare you the rest of my theological-philosophical treatise on the nature of human and divine love here, but I do hope I can, with today's poem, and the encounter between Christian and pagan faiths contained therein, point very vaguely towards some degree of this love.)  

One last note before I let you keep reading: in this poem I dabble a bit in the use of a device of old Norse poetry known as the "kenning."  Kennings are endless fascinating, in my undoubtedly correct opinion, and if you are curious you can gain a basic knowledge of them HERE.

Enjoy & God bless!

+JMJ

Bjorn

By Caitlin Clancy

Copyright 2014

They came from the doors

Of the deathless realm

And salted our fields behind

Grey smoke wafts about

The mist-shrouded helm –

A new scar upon a young mind

The dragon-head rocks

Like the world we lost

Like the home-hearths they broke and burned

Too late did we look

Through the piercing frost

Our lesson by fire would be learned

Red ripples brush my stiff shoulders

Green folds blow, wave-wrap my waist

God’s tears drench down from the Heavens

Would that my word had been ‘haste!’

Black haze belonged to that morning

And bronze-heat consumed the fast night

To long lay the day in their trusses

To short sped our trial and flight

The strike of the cold on my temples

The taste of the newcomer’s scent

Surely the Temple was gladder,

When God’s own high garments it rent!

Leaning on pine-hewn post-prison

Fast-tied hands begging for help

But none here will heed Supplication

Unless for to drown it a whelp

In chains for cold priestly silver,

Bound tight for beloved Freyja’s tears[1]

Sword-sleep[2] strewn about like the ashes

The sun hewn down by Thor’s spears

A sigh escapes the prisoner

The dark boy turns to read

He finds her face is open

Unmarked save fear and need

Whate’er he sees her hiding

His own lips do conceal

Perhaps after long waiting

Her fresh-made wound will heal

His hard thoughts fight inside him

His feeder-of-raven[3] heart

Begins to learn the question

That makes all lordly art

But ignorance is blinding

And he has none to tell

The wound-hoe[4] at his side

Has marked the world as fell

Brown hide of Gunnr’s horse[5]

Enslung[6] about his form

Dark eyes breed black hist’ry

Which ash fires still keep warm

The sky-jewel[7] fades

The west is caught

In the slumber-storm of night

The helmsman nods upon his oar

And stirs to keep them right

The winter ices over them,

The tall mast and the side,

But still the boy looks onward

And thought, if she had died...

A flicker of the bane-of-wood[8]

Wakes gently in his breast

Of sleep, food, home, her kinfolk –

Of all she is bereft

Dark windows to a lighter soul

Glance from prow to stern

None will see it, none will know,

But only one will learn

She shivers in the ice-blast

Enwrapping her soft form

Then sudden, light and tranquil –

Wolf-skin to keep life warm

She wakens and she wonders

She aches to turn her head

But sees nothing save starlight

From eyes long dry and red

A sigh once more

And then a tear

And then the world is gone

Her white neck arching slowly,

Head drooping like a fawn

Beneath, the swan-road[9]

Breathes away

And blows to other lands

Wanderers bearing precious hoards

And girls with gentle hands

Beneath the prow

New warrior’s heart

Bleeds like the birds he slew

Dark eyes give out cold burning drops

Recalling slaughter-dew[10]

Faces flicker in the night

Children he never knew

He turns and then recoils –

His image in a shield

Was this, then, why he toiled?

For this broken, blemished yield?

Hard hands unloose the woven belt

‘Round ancient, sterner sword

A clatter strikes upon the deck

Of steel and broken cord –

Repulsed his one day’s hist’ry,

He inhales the life restored,

And in that still salt darkness

He made a girl his lord.

---

[1] “Frejya’s tears” : A Norse kenning meaning gold.

[2] A kenning: death.

[3] The kenning for “warrior.”

[4] The kenning for “sword.”

[5] “Gunnr’s horse” – a wolf.

[6] A coinage of mine.  Means “slung about” – as in, a cape that is hung about one’s shoulders.

[7] A kenning denoting the sun.

[8] The kenning meaning “fire.”

[9] A kenning meaning “the sea.”

[10] A kenning: blood.

Mid-January Mind Games

And for my customary between-posts-interlude: riddles!  The latest brand and style.  Enjoy!

1J. 

Wide, glowing orb

Or slimmer slice

Dies back and grows

White-hued as ice

What is it? 

2J.

Red-capped as a cardinal

Black-frocked as a priest

White-speckled as an old dog

Lithe, tapping, airy beast!

What is it? 

N.b.: Answers, per my custom, are found on the "answers" page above.  

Emmanuel, God is With Us: A Christmas Reflection on Naming

Good tidings to you, my friends!  Rejoice and be glad!

I hope this very, very tardy post finds each of you well and blessed by a Holy Christmas.  Today I offer for your consideration a few of my own reflections, thoughts which have but lately occurred to me, though some of their beginnings have been with me a long time now.  (Please note that the following reflects only opinions that I hold and suppositions I have made, and as such are liable to be in error.  Corrections, should you deem them necessary or warranted, I would gladly accept. )

In light of the coming among us of He-Who-Is-Named "God-With-Us," I propose to refer anew to the oft-parroted question: what's in a name?  It seems to me that in our present age too few of us give thought to the real and quite serious implications of this question, and too few understand how true it is that "A good name is more desirable than great riches" (Proverbs 22:1).  (Note: though this verse in context seems to me to refer more to one's "name" in the sense of one's reputation - as opposed to in the sense of one's literal, given name - I think it is still applicable here.)

Before we ask what is "in" a name, I think it is first appropriate to ask: what is a name?  Is it simply a label, a word by which something can be spoken of?  That a person's name does serve to identify him, to separate him from others and point him out in a crowd, is, I think, not contested.  We need labels to sort out "who's who," and names do a good job of serving this purpose.  But names, I think, are not merely labels.  Or at least not labels in the sense of a brand-name sticker on a package of cereal; human names, angelic names, God's name - these names are names of beings, of realities that are persons rather than objects, and that go far beyond simple identification.  These names are meant to signify a being's essence.

Names are meant to convey knowledge.  And individuality.  And personhood.  They indicate man's unique connection to other men, to the angels, and to God.  Indeed, we take our names - in fact the whole concept of naming anything - ultimately from God.  Recall how in Genesis God names the different parts of creation, and then, in what I regard as a very grave yet wonderful gift to man, lets man name the beasts and birds?  (It is interesting to note that this is done in the context of man being given dominion over creation; could we say then, that giving or knowing a name gives one - if only in a small way - a kind of dominion over another?  Perhaps this only means "dominion" in the sense of knowing another, but still - possessing and giving names are in my mind undoubtedly powerful things.)

A good name, therefore, should signify something of the reality of the person and their relationship to other beings (such as, for instance, members of their family and/or other forebears, historical and spiritual - this is part of why I am highly in favor of naming children after saints, but I will not bore you with that discussion now).  A true name would not only signify but actually express the whole reality, the whole essence, of the person.

In the Holy Scriptures, we find God Himself not only naming but also renaming parts of his creation - I am thinking specifically of individuals whom he has called for a specific purpose, or to whom he makes a promise: Jacob is renamed Israel, Saul becomes Paul, Abram and Sarai are Abraham and Sarah, and - perhaps most significantly - Simon becomes Peter (meaning "rock" - a name which, according to what I have been taught, was previously a term applied to God alone).  It seems to me that in these instances the people God renames had good names before, but they receive better ones in their place.  I say "better" because these names tend to reflect more perfectly the role God has assigned to each - thus, it would seem that the names express more fully the person's essence.

Still, though, I do not say these better names were what one could call "true" names, because it is not wholly clear that this is the final change in name that will take place for these people, or that their new earthly name is the ultimate expression of their whole nature.  In Revelation 2:17, we read: "Whoever has ears ought to hear what the Spirit says to the churches.  To the victor I shall give some of the hidden manna; I shall also give a white amulet upon which is inscribed a new name, which no one knows except the one who receives it." Now, I do not pretend that I understand more than the barest fraction of Revelation, a wildly enthralling but exceedingly perplexing book of the Bible, and certainly make no attempt to declare what this verse certainly means.  Nevertheless, I think this verse could possibly indicate that those who attain Heaven are given a name made for them by God Himself.  God, the maker of our essences both as human beings and specifically as individuals, would thus be bestowing on us a term which denotes that nature, that essence, most perfectly.  This name therefore, should it actually exist, would be a "true name" indeed.  

For these and other reasons, then, I would argue strongly that a name - even a simple, ordinary, given-by-your-parents type of earthly name - is an intimate part of a person and can affect not only aspects of one's life such as self-esteem but indeed more importantly who one becomes.  For myself (and perhaps this is just an outgrowth of my fascination with names; take it as you will) I have long had a strange, strong and almost unexplainable desire to "live up to my name" - to be and to become my name, in a sense.  In my own experience, the mere fact that I was given a good name with a holy meaning has acted as a spur to further press me towards a virtuous end that, though I am obliged to seek it anyway, I do not think I would otherwise have felt such a burning longing to possess.  It is as if I want it because I recognize it to be something that should always be a part of me.  Indeed, it should be me.  I should be it.  My essence, though not identical with my name, should be expressed through it.  The word which people use when they call upon me should actually call upon me, and not just upon a label that has come to be associated with me.  (For the record, the name "Caitlin" is the Gaelic form of "Catherine" and is generally agreed to mean "pure" or "pure one.")

Well, I have long lost the brief, two-thought post that this was supposed to be.  Instead I feel I have created the beginnings of a book, if I ever find time enough to write it.  I have much more to say, particularly on the concept of "true" names, which even the old Norse peoples recognized (if my memory serves), but for now I will leave you with these thoughts.

I won't presume to tell you what to name your children, should you have any, but I will advise you to be careful of how you do so.  There are better and worse ways.  I would dare to say there are even good and evil ways (it is not insignificant that part of the Baptismal Rite is the priest or deacon asking the parents what name they are giving their child -- and though the Church, to the best of my knowledge, no longer requires a saint's name to be used, names that are anti-Catholic or anti-Christian are off limits).

If naming, as at least I believe it is, is truly a moral issue, then it should not be taken lightly.  There are fair names and foul ones, strange names and ordinary ones, wild names and sensible ones. But for all the myriad of names and meanings and motives and persons, one fact remains: names are important, powerful things.  Naming is high and holy practice - the Word became Flesh, after all, and was named by both God (as announced by Gabriel) and man (declared by St. Joseph as Christ's foster-father).  Thus, naming has become for us not only an ability but also a great matter, a duty, and a grave privilege indeed.