Black the Day and Grim

This was another hymn from Easter week 2010, which I did for that Thursday, appropriate now again for this Thursday:

Black the Day and Grim (pdf)

He was pure of heart and clean,
was yet condemned – a bitter scene;
hear how the scorn and mad revilings ring!

The focus is, of course, on the massive injustice men conspired together to effect against the Son of God, and how God so ordered that our salvation was secured by this means, and in His condemnation was condemnation done away with for His sheep. As it says, His death was victory, the successful completion and end of His life’s ministry, not just in spite of appearing to be a total failure, but precisely in that it was so shockingly and foully perpetrated. It had to be so bad to be so good.

It makes sense that Good Friday has been known as Black Friday (it is somewhat laughable that the moniker has been appropriated for the Friday after Thanksgiving).

Of course, His Father vindicated Him on the third day.

When This Devil Calls

Similar in design and scope to this effort, but written earlier, in late February of this year, I give you this sonnet:

When This Devil Calls (pdf)

When this devil calls, and “has God said” sneers,
inflaming fears – though surely has He said,
to you He has not so as sure…

The old snake’s question to Eve is turned, for this particular believer (yes, believer – one who believes God has said) into a question of assurance – has God said His wonderful words of promise to you, you in particular?

The answer given is certainly not a full answer, but it is an answer, and I think necessarily contained within whatever full answer there is. In simplest form, it is – look to Christ, not yourself; and, to receive His word just is to receive His word for you. Faith has the victory, and wins the prize.

Mountain Scene

Just because…

(No, I won’t try to come up with some justification for it that connects it to the previous post.)

However, in case you’re wondering, the location is somewhere above Banff, Alberta.

Our God and Mighty Father Reigns

At the beginning of its life (Feb. 2009) this hymn had a refrain that went something like

Not undone, not unknown,
not unmade before the throne.

I decided that was too obsessively fearful. Part of approaching God in faith and through Christ is to try to be fully assured of His good will toward us. We must believe He is, and rewards those who earnestly seek Him.

Mostly, though, this hymn does deal with the problem of God’s glory and our unworthiness to approach, where presumption might mean destruction. And it is, of course, centered around Christ our Substitute, our Sacrifice, our Pleasing Aroma wafting up on high. Appropriate, I think, for this week!

Our God and Mighty Father Reigns (pdf)

All glory be to Christ the Priest:
He offered not the paschal beast
but gave with final loving breath
His spotless life in perfect death,
His body sundered, bone from bone,
to forge us union at the throne.

Seven Hot Ones

I had a chance to write seven new triolets since Friday, so here they are.

I Wish the Tree Was Stronger (pdf)

My Love Is a Weak and Inconsistent Thing (pdf)

A Tangle Ties Itself (pdf)

A tangle ties itself in thick
lines crossing; underneath she smiles
and holds it up, anew each tick
a tangle ties – itself in thick
cords threading each way as quick
to her as miles our road and miles
a tangle ties itself in thick
lines crossing underneath; she smiles.

O People, Sing Ye (pdf)

See Kings of Earth (pdf)

I Shovel Snow (pdf)

The Oaks Stand Old (pdf)

There you go, and happy reading.

Within His Sanctuary Praise

From June 24, 2007, here is a triolet I did based on Psalm 150.

Within His Sanctuary Praise

I will give the whole thing here, for it isn’t long:

Within His sanctuary praise
the LORD for all His mighty deeds!
To God let every creature raise
within His sanctuary praise!
Let him who dances and who plays
the trumpets, timbrels, harps, and reeds
within His sanctuary praise
the LORD for all His mighty deeds!

Most of my triolets are in iambic tetrameter (as this one). I also routinely try to make the refrained lines do different things each time they come up. Here the differences are not too stark, but you will notice some of the words playing different grammatical roles, e.g. praise in line 1 vs. line 4.

The possibilities for wordplay in the triolet form should thus be quite apparent!

The Triolet

This, for a time, was one of my favorite poetic forms to write in – not least because it is so small! They aren’t necessarily easy to do well, and I’m not saying I always have, but for a little bit of effort you can often produce a little eight-line specimen that makes the eye twinkle.

Anyhow, the triolet (tree-oh-lay, in personal use), being formal poetry, and being a form much less well known than the sonnet, is probably not widely known or produced – in English, I should say – right now. I didn’t know about it until sometime during 2007, when I found some in an anthology (this one) under the name of Patrick Cary (or Carey).

Here are the triolets credited to Cary, which would have been written in the 1600’s. Cary was (per Wikipedia) for a brief time a monk at a Benedictine monastery in France, which I believe explains the perspective (which I can’t also recommend vis-a-vis the monastic vocation) in these pieces. It is yet sad to think that these hopes, which appear to accord with some initial period of commitment to monkery, were so soon dashed.

Here is one by Robert Bridges, done much more recently (1876). If we can take Wikipedia at its word, the main article on the triolet credits Bridges with reintroducing it among English speaking people. Thus it went, I would guess, from complete obscurity to somewhat less complete obscurity.

Walking

With ladybug shoes…

Fresh Waters of the Spirit Flow

Here is one of my favorite efforts thus far at hymn-writing. It was quite the adventure to put together! I began in January, 2011 and brought it to its current form by that May.

Fresh Waters of the Spirit Flow (pdf)

The Holy Spirit animates
and gives them power to pray –
ravines to raise, and crooked straits
and hills to fling away,
that they together with their God
should tend a level plain,
His streams to nourish, deep as broad,
His hands to sift the grain.

Wild Grapes

This was, from June 12, 2010, the Isaiah sonnet installment for Chapter 5. It’s quite the picture of judgment, as God surveys and tests the work of those He left to tend His grapevines. Judgment begins at the House of God, even the Garden thereof.

Wild Grapes (pdf)

This worthless vintage much have I deplored,
and it shall be the last; with wall to rend,
and hedge to wreck, a waste shall be its end…