What is it about plainsongs that are so haunting and timeless? Originally based in Gregorian chant, perhaps the most famous one is O COME, O COME EMMANUEL. Several years ago I recorded IMMORTAL, INVISIBLE (on my “Beautiful Illusion” cd) and later my friend Jeff Templin created a gorgeous slide show to go with it. The effect is like an almost instantaneous purifying meditation.
On this second day of Christmas help yourself to another gift by going to:
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Gerald closed his eyes to rest, and found eternity.
Pilgrim, see him still. Preserved in youthful beauty.
The story? The story as was told to me:
Like all young men he sought to fight.
To vanquish wrong. To lift his sword. To prove his worth.
He was a century too late. Or more.
Searching plain to mountain, cave to sea,
his boots worn thin as skin, he traced the tracks.
His only hope, which led him to Pathetico;
a haggard dragon, wan, forlorn, with slackened scales of gray.
Only a coward would cut him down.
The man in throes of deep despair
cast his sword to God knows where.
This would-be knight was more than lost.
His soul had ceased to guide him.
Having not one thing to name or claim,
true north and south crisscrossed within.
He wandered off into a meadow
where small blue flowers sang, clamoring, clutching at his feet.
Which way earth? Which way heaven?
But, what there, in the distance?
Pathetico had seen, and straight way loved the man.
Friendless but for swallows and flies that buzzed his head,
he followed on in loyalty with dragging tail behind.
Dizzied by infinite flowers of blue, (the genus which he could not place)
in rusted armor of massive weight, the weary man fell down,
crushing four hundred thousand petals.
The blossoms screamed and fought to rise.
Pushing up with all their might they caused him then to levitate,
and thus transformed him into saint, as witnessed by some angels.
But Gerald, sleeping, sleeping still, missed the marvel of his fate.
(His form, adorned, hung on my wall, looks strangely like my husband.)
©2011 Mariénne Kreitlow, Living Song
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Low light. Low light. This time of year we get low light.
Long, tall shadows stretch from the trees,
the churches’ steeples and propped up skiis. Oh——–
High light. High light. The southern hemisphere’s in high light.
My friends in New Zealand, my friends in Brasil
take the warmth while we get the chill.
But the light inside, the light inside, the light inside…
The light inside, the light inside…
Our sight. Our sight. Just a bit of the spectrum. A splice of the light.
But even through the bleakest, blackest night of the year
Light of Love won’t disappear. Oh——–
Sun bright. Sun bright. Sequins glitter in fields of white.
Earth turns. The sky is clear.
Far flung stars are dazzling mirrors.
But the light inside, the light inside, the light inside…
The light inside, the light inside…
But the light inside, the light inside, the light inside…
The light inside blazing brighter than we can bear.
Blazing brighter than we can bear.
©2011 Mariénne Kreitlow, Living Song, BMI
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