Art and Design Books and Reading Creativity and Creating Extemporaneous Miscellany
by amo
leave a comment
A Gang of Cavorting Porpoises
Yesterday, Orchids was featured in the Painters in Modern Times group at RedBubble. I am grateful for the hosts’ support and encouragement!
I’m reading what is probably the best book I’ll read this year, In the Likeness of God
I’m beginning to think one of the best gifts God gave us (to learn with, anyway) is analogy. Earlier this year, I read Mind Of The Maker
I’ve never felt I was particularly talented at finding/creating analogies myself, but perhaps it is something I should pursue. I seem to learn best from them. Jesus’ parables are analogies. I wonder how one goes about learning how to work with analogies?
(Actually, I have a short story I tried to write once that was an analogy, but I never finished it. I have more ideas than I have self discipline, and the light bulb that goes on over my head is sometimes a strobe light.)
In any event, I find myself wanting to quote extensively from this book, but I try not to quote too much from any one book here. Right now, I’m only on page 175 (of 552, though it’s not difficult reading), and I’ve got 3 fantastic passages I’d love to share! Since I really should just pick one, I guess I’ll go with the fun simile (i.e., analogy, if you don’t split hairs):
I can understand the complex process of keratin producing rigid fingernails and horses’ hooves. But no amount of training will lessen my astonishment as I watch a single stalk of keratin push its way out of a follicle, grow erect and proud and shockingly unfurl as a peacock feather. What was chemistry becomes beauty. It is as if a brilliant Appalachian quilt springs from a rock, as if a desert suddenly births a gang of cavorting porpoises.
Remember, Love
Oh, would you have me linger here
To dally, Love, with you,
While Duty’s voice is calling clear
Across the waters blue?
Remember, Love,
’Tis Duty’s hand that brings to you
Honor’s brightest bloom;
’Tis Duty’s voice that sings to you
To banish fear and gloom.
’Tis Duty’s heart that cares for you,
’Tis Duty’s arm that bares for you,
And do or die it dares for you.
Remember, Love.
Oh, look not so reproachful, Love,
From tender eyes and true;
I hold not Duty’s voice above
The call of heart, of home, of you.
Remember, Love.
To me you’ll ever be the same,
And nearest when I’m far;
For Duty’s but your other name
Amid the smoke of war.
Thus Love and Duty cry to me,
And all mankind they tie to me;
Nor faith in God can die to me.
Remember, Love.
If you should ever call me, Love,
Across the distant blue;
If you should ever call, and I
Should fail to answer you,
Remember, Love.
I am the star that glows for you
Beyond the realm of night.
I’m the flag I waved for you,
And with my life-blood laved for you.
I’m all things Duty saved for you.
Remember, Love.
—Ernest Neal
from Yonah and Other Poems
Rock of Ages
Rock of Ages
Rock of Ages, cleft for me,
Let me hide myself in Thee;
Let the water and the blood,
From Thy riven side which flowed,
Be of sin the double cure;
Save from wrath and make me pure.
Not the labour of my hands
Can fulfil Thy law’s demands;
Could my zeal no respite know,
Could my tears for ever flow,
All for sin could not atone;
Thou must save, and Thou alone.
Nothing in my hand I bring,
Simply to the cross I cling;
Naked, come to Thee for dress;
Helpless, look to Thee for grace;
Foul, I to the fountain fly;
Wash me, Saviour, else I die.
While I draw this fleeting breath,
When my eyelids close in death,
When I soar to worlds unknown,
See Thee on Thy judgement throne,
Rock of Ages, cleft for me,
Let me hide myself in Thee.
-Augustus Montague Toplady (1740-1778)
Eating Crow
Eating Crow
Lord, of course it is wisdom that I seek.
Of course I seek to grow.
I want my heart to grow more meek.
– But I always end up eating crow.
I want to conform to Your will,
but that row is tough to hoe.
I always end up eating my fill
Of that awful black bird, crow.
I’ve had it boiled and chicken fried;
I’ve had crow fricassee;
I’ve had my crow in black crow pie;
I’ve had roasted crow with brie.
Lord, if you would be so kind,
give me a new crow recipe;
my tongue is faster than my mind,
faster than my eyes can see.
I’ve had it at the church potluck
I’ve had it at family dinners, too.
Oh, Lord, for once could I please have duck
and avoid my tongue-fashioned stew?
My fingers also fly too fast
Immortalizing my flaws in cyberspace
Canned crow, frozen — it’s preserved to last.
– I’ll be eating it all my earthly days.
Only You can save me from my fate,
my life as an avivore.
Purge my wrongness, my pride and my hate,
let me show it is You I adore.
I’ve had my crow boiled and chicken fried;
I’ve had it with a side of greed;
I’ve had my crow in black crow pie.
I’m stuffed to bursting with need.
Only You can save me from my fate,
Only You, the One I adore.
Purge my wrongness, my pride and my hate,
Make me holy evermore.
– A.M. Otwell, 2008
