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Gloria Peirano | Advent and Christmas
Art by Gloria Peirano
Province of Peru
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Poetry for Advent and Christmas
Province of England – Wales and Province of the United States
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Advent 1994
“And John sent asking
Are You the One we are looking for?"
We have so tinsel-towned the story
that God's inbreaking Love'
ceases to amaze us.
We know the words so pat
The Angel declared
and Mary said.
That God should so love the World
To seed, fruit, bear that Love
nine months
enwombed
till she brought forth
The First born,
God’s love manifest.
What is it?
How is it?
To bear God's Love?
Easier to seek and name it outside
but to bear it humanwise
To see it in another’s eyes
- in the tenderness of lovers touch -
- in the intimacy of heart -
though Emmanuel - God-with-us.
wished it so
Is it not amazing?
The Word is made Flesh.
Anne Hine rscj
Province of England – Wales
“Waters have broken out in the desert,
and streams in the wilderness”
Isaiah 35,6
You have washed my heart
with living waters.
Pain passed through it
in torrents of love
and left it clean and cool.
Pools are in the wilderness
deep in my heart crags.
All I emptied for You
springs deep and clear
in steeps of silence.
Green peace lingers
on the fringes of my heart.
Healing brooks steel me
for dry seasons, barren days.
My heart is Your wilderness.
Look on it with love
Till it brims
and brims for You.
Carmen Smith rscj
Province of the United States +
Warning
Be careful, Lord, this year.
We may not let you in.
We fear
the color of your skin,
your poverty,
and do not wholly trust
your speech, whose ambiguity can irritate
those who want things
black or white, not gray.
Peace and the sword must
not cohabitate
any more than may
the wolf and lamb,
the hawk and dove
relate in love.
So state
your platform well before
you come knocking
at our door.
The scar
of sin sits deep
in church and state, ,
and inconsolable Rachels weep lost sons, sons lost in war,
in drugs, in alcohol and crime, in misplaced dreams.
0 bid all time
stand still
among our petty human schemes. And if you dare and will,
step quietly again
into our hearts. Their pain
will be familiar.
Now you will know
how far
and where to go.
Anna Mae Marheineke rscj
Province of the United States
Risk
RISK is God
asking a girl's yes
is her giving him
naked birth in the night
is shepherds
trusting a song
and questing kings
daring their star.
Verse for a Christmas Card
Today would they have come in a borrowed car
bumper to bumper, looking for a place
"No Vacancy" on all the motels?
Would the birthing be in a gas station
passersby, homeless too, offering help?
Beyond the DJ music could they hear
a new song piercing the night
stars dancing, and a child's first cry?
Helen Condon rscj
Province of the United States
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