To Him who presses curiosities four-to-a-row
across the dimpled backs of infant hands;
Glory be.
To Him who has made the dust of the hay barn
settle in drowsy glory through a slant line of sun;
Who has birthed three naked, new mice,
just pink, bare thumbs, sucking out blind thirst
in a mother’s tossings and tendings of the grasses of the earth;
Glory be.
Who has swelled the heavy teats of the cow?
Who has made them drip milk in drops,
sweet, white puffs and sighs on the dry brown barn floor?
Who has wetted her brown, round, empathetic eyes?
Who has given her a tail to smack against her meat?
Glory be.
To Him who has made the cool March wind
snap the curtains to applause;
Who hovers (might He even cluck or coo?),
wing thrown round about His beloved,
heady as the hot underside of a hen;
Who opens up the earth like a lap,
belly out, leaned back, arms thrown wide,
feet planted in a father’s welcome,
Glory Be.
Rebecca K. Reynolds is the editorial director of Oasis Family Media and Sky Turtle Press. She is the author of a text-faithful modern prose rendering of Edmund Spenser’s 1590’s epic poem, The Faerie Queene and of Courage, Dear Heart by Nav Press. Rebecca is a longtime member of the Rabbit Room, and she has spoken at Hutchmoot both in the US and the UK. She taught high school literature for seven years and has written lyrics for Ron Block of Alison Krauss, Union Station.
7 Comments
Kathy
Thank you. Hallelujah.
Lisa
Lovely, Rebecca. Imagery that invites contemplation; perfect for a slow summer’s day. Thanks so much.
Chris Slaten
More please. Do it again!
BONNIE BUCKINGHAM
This encore is stunning.
Makes me want more and more.
Love the very last part of arms wide open in a father’s welcome.
Also snapping the curtains in applause!
And the cow and the mouse back to the infant’s hands.
Yearnings.
Glory be, indeed!
( wish Hopkins were alive to read this)
Tucker Sigourney
I’m sure you already know, but… this is a beautiful poem. I loved the first one as well for its own character, and this is a brilliant complement to it. I especially appreciate the sense of closeness about it – the intimate phenomenality of the descriptions of scenes and animals, and the warm personality of the biblical imagery – which draws out from the previous poem (in which God was glorious for his farness and his mystery and his otherness) the sense that glory is also saturating all common things, and that God our Father is every bit as high as the King of Kings. Ah! It’s just… magnificent.
Aaron
Beautiful.
Patrick Mitchell
This.
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