modesty in a Christian context

A letter from the women of Providence, my church, on the topic of modesty.

I have struggled with the concept of modesty quite a lot, believing that it is primarily a humble attitude in a person, not limited to the clothing women wear, and I'm so proud of the women in this church for the stand they are taking.

preparing for Lent

     I know, Lent is still pretty far away, but it is one of my favourite Christian traditions. It has been since I read about it in a book many many moons ago, when I was about 14. I start planning what I'm going to give up months in advance. I relish the idea of the upcoming sacrifice. That probably says something about me, that I like to give something up only for a defined period of time. I'm great at it usually, provided that it is something concrete--say junk food, not my snooze button. (The snooze button experiment of 2000-something was a definite failure.) This year I've been trying to identify what would be the most beneficial thing to give up, and I'm thinking it won't be something concrete. I'm thinking it will be harder. I'm thinking that what I'm going to try to give up is the fear of man, their perceptions of me, or least my perception of their perceptions. I'm thinking that the idea behind Lent isn't just to sacrifice something, or to relish the feeling of asceticism I get, but rather to take the time to look at what is holding me back from Jesus, and to let go of that, to focus my eyes upon Jesus. And I'm also thinking, why wait?
   
    If I know that this is a stumbling block for me, and it is, why wait? I spend far too much time being paralyzed by how people will react, and often that fear stops me from acting at all. It wraps me up in my head, imagining their judgement, their disapproval, and beating myself up with it. And that needs to stop. The only judgement I should be concerning myself with is God's.

The Lonely Land

Cedar and jagged fir
uplift sharp barbs
against the gray
and cloud-piled sky;
and in the bay
blown, spume and windrift
and thin, bitter spray
snap
at the whirling sky;
and the pine trees
lean one way.

A wild duck calls
to her mate,
and the ragged
and passionate tones
stagger and fall,
and recover,
and stagger and fall,
on those stones--
are lost
in the lapping of water
on smooth, flat stones.

This is a beauty
of dissonance,
this resonance
of stony strand,
this smoky cry
curled over a black pine
like a broken
and wind-battered branch
when the wind
bends the tops of the pines
and curdles the sky
from the north.

This is the beauty
of strength
broken by strength
and still strong.

A.J.M. Smith

I have a tumblr now. But I don't use it a lot.

But sometimes I post pictures.

everyday object poem

smells like blood
and silicone and soap—
dusty and sharp,
like iron filings
or old copper pennies.

began white, virginal
translucent—

now the colour of tarnished hopes
and new (childless) plans

holds  the sloughed,
rich blood
that is pulled
from my womb

by a thin, tapered
end.

Found Poem

inside this triangle,
rebels were inspired
to be in a state of insurrection

their actions subsequently
match their assumption that
rebellion was going on elsewhere—

and later their realisation
that they were alone
in the fight. Open rebellion unraveled—

some survival of the old
sentiments—this old agrarian agenda
(especially in the northern parts,

where the two are most
likely to have overlapped)
drifted back into the various parts

scattered by bad weather,
a footnote in history was
unraveling that night.

Clementine

Swirls of ink thoughts
inhabiting corners
of pages everywhere

Poetry borderlands
defined and liminal
sketched in words

that taste and sound.

like noses

and my heart is broken

and broken

and broken

and I wonder if hearts are like noses

that need to be broken

to be straitened

to be righted

and I know, oh I know

that my heart

will be broken again

on my own

wickedness

and I hope, oh I hope

that my heart

will be broken again

on God’s love

Sad poem that I love

Neglect
R. T. Smith

Is the scent of apple boughs smoking
in the woodstove what I will remember
of the Red Delicious I brought down, ashamed

that I could not convince its limbs to render fruit?
Too much neglect will do that, skew the sap's
passage, blacken leaves, dry the bark and heart.

I should have lopped the dead limbs early
and watched each branch with a goshawk's eye,
patching with medicinal pitch, offering water,

compost and mulch, but I was too enchanted
by pear saplings, flowers and the pasture,
too callow to believe that death's inevitable

for any living being unloved, untended.
What remains is this armload of applewood
now feeding the stove's smolder. Splendor

ripens a final time in the firebox, a scarlet
harvest headed, by dawn, to embers.
Two decades of shade and blossoms - tarts

and cider, bees dazzled by the pollen,
spare elegance in ice - but what goes is gone.
Smoke is all, through this lesson in winter

regret, I've been given to remember.
Smoke, and Red Delicious apples redder
than a passing cardinal's crest or cinders.

taken from http://www.loc.gov/poetry/180/

story

a landscape sketch
a colour palette
some characters
with some flaws
knitted together--
in a wavy afghan
something homely
and lovely
held loosely in my mind
and beginning to take
shape on paper
of paper
and delicately inscribed
so as not to lose
any life in the pinning
down of the butterfly's
wings