WEBVTT 00:00:07.779 --> 00:00:10.259 Welcome to Franciscan Spirit. It's great to be 00:00:10.259 --> 00:00:13.839 with you. This episode features the great poet 00:00:13.839 --> 00:00:17.579 and beloved Franciscan friar, Father Murray Bodo. 00:00:18.039 --> 00:00:20.980 Murray Bodo is a Franciscan priest and an award 00:00:20.980 --> 00:00:22.839 -winning author of numerous books, including 00:00:22.839 --> 00:00:25.719 his best -selling title, Francis, the Journey 00:00:25.719 --> 00:00:29.160 and the Dream. He has had poems, stories, and 00:00:29.160 --> 00:00:31.640 articles published in magazines and literary 00:00:31.640 --> 00:00:34.380 journals in the United States, England, and Ireland, 00:00:34.520 --> 00:00:37.380 and he's also a founding staff member of Franciscan 00:00:37.380 --> 00:00:40.539 Pilgrimage Programs, where he led yearly pilgrimages 00:00:40.539 --> 00:00:44.100 to Assisi, Italy, for over 40 years before retiring 00:00:44.100 --> 00:00:48.359 in 2020. Father Murray recently wrote his 12th 00:00:48.359 --> 00:00:51.939 book of poetry, Brother Wind and Air, A Lifetime 00:00:51.939 --> 00:00:54.939 in Verse, which is the focus of our conversation 00:00:54.939 --> 00:00:58.649 this episode. This interview was actually recorded 00:00:58.649 --> 00:01:02.030 last April, almost a year ago, when this book 00:01:02.030 --> 00:01:04.870 was originally released. But when it was decided 00:01:04.870 --> 00:01:08.730 for Franciscan Media's book line to be discontinued, 00:01:08.769 --> 00:01:11.549 people were no longer able to find the book and 00:01:11.549 --> 00:01:15.349 order it. That is, until now. The book can now 00:01:15.349 --> 00:01:18.510 be ordered exclusively through Ascension Press' 00:01:18.709 --> 00:01:21.870 website, which I have linked to in the show notes. 00:01:22.730 --> 00:01:26.090 If you like poetry, this is a really beautiful 00:01:26.090 --> 00:01:30.670 book. It wrestles with aging. And to me, I mean, 00:01:30.689 --> 00:01:33.870 it really, I think it really inspires us to look 00:01:33.870 --> 00:01:36.950 deeply at the moments in our lives that have 00:01:36.950 --> 00:01:40.109 shaped us. I do wish people could have found 00:01:40.109 --> 00:01:42.670 the book last year. However, I do find it fitting 00:01:42.670 --> 00:01:45.709 that Brother Wind and Air is available during 00:01:45.709 --> 00:01:48.750 this Jubilee year. of Saint Francis of Assisi. 00:01:49.129 --> 00:01:51.930 Father Murray may be one of the most respected 00:01:51.930 --> 00:01:55.090 Franciscan poets around today, and his words 00:01:55.090 --> 00:01:57.930 invite us to open our senses to the divine breath 00:01:57.930 --> 00:02:00.790 that permeates all things good. beautiful and 00:02:00.790 --> 00:02:03.829 true, a divine breath. He has spent his vocation 00:02:03.829 --> 00:02:07.750 as a Franciscan writer attempting to name. It's 00:02:07.750 --> 00:02:10.430 for this reason I've decided not to include reflection 00:02:10.430 --> 00:02:13.530 segments in this episode. Father Murray reads 00:02:13.530 --> 00:02:16.009 several poems throughout this interview that 00:02:16.009 --> 00:02:19.750 serve as their own invitations to pause and contemplate 00:02:19.750 --> 00:02:23.129 what was said. Please, I invite you to give yourself 00:02:23.129 --> 00:02:26.599 permission to really sit with these poems. and 00:02:26.599 --> 00:02:29.240 perhaps even do a type of Lectio Divina with 00:02:29.240 --> 00:02:32.159 Father Murray's words. It's a beautiful book, 00:02:32.280 --> 00:02:35.219 and I hope you enjoy this conversation as much 00:02:35.219 --> 00:02:38.719 as I did. So without further ado, here is Father 00:02:38.719 --> 00:02:47.159 Murray Bodo. Enjoy. Really great to be with you, 00:02:47.199 --> 00:02:49.699 Father Murray. So let's begin by talking about 00:02:49.699 --> 00:02:52.340 why you wrote your new book of poetry, Brother 00:02:52.340 --> 00:02:56.169 Wind and Air, A Lifetime in Verse. What's the 00:02:56.169 --> 00:02:59.349 story behind this book, Father Murray? Well, 00:02:59.469 --> 00:03:02.889 I guess in one sense I could say it came to me 00:03:02.889 --> 00:03:09.370 because I had just retired about two or three 00:03:09.370 --> 00:03:15.830 years before from being on the Assisi pilgrimages 00:03:15.830 --> 00:03:21.150 for 43 years. I had gone every year to Assisi 00:03:21.150 --> 00:03:27.740 for about three months. In the process, I wrote 00:03:27.740 --> 00:03:32.539 a book of poetry called Teaching the Soul to 00:03:32.539 --> 00:03:37.979 Speak. And that was kind of my farewell to Assisi 00:03:37.979 --> 00:03:43.939 and to all the pilgrimages. And so when that 00:03:43.939 --> 00:03:48.479 book was published and came out, I kind of had 00:03:48.479 --> 00:03:52.340 that feeling, what do I do now? Do I write more 00:03:52.340 --> 00:03:57.680 poetry? Am I finished with poetry? And I realized 00:03:57.680 --> 00:04:00.939 right away I wasn't finished with poetry because 00:04:00.939 --> 00:04:06.300 the word is like life to me. It's like breath, 00:04:06.539 --> 00:04:11.280 reading the word, hearing the word, preaching 00:04:11.280 --> 00:04:18.120 the word, and working with words as a poet. So 00:04:18.120 --> 00:04:27.399 I wasn't quite sure what I should do or should 00:04:27.399 --> 00:04:33.699 I wait. So I waited about maybe half a year, 00:04:33.839 --> 00:04:38.660 and I said, I think it's time to just see if 00:04:38.660 --> 00:04:45.019 I should write or if that feels good, if that's 00:04:45.019 --> 00:04:50.649 where I should go. So almost immediately after 00:04:50.649 --> 00:04:57.670 that, I had my fountain pen. I'm 19th century. 00:04:58.250 --> 00:05:02.990 I write with a fountain pen on yellow pads. And 00:05:02.990 --> 00:05:07.990 I had it, and it was sitting at my, this is an 00:05:07.990 --> 00:05:11.329 Italian Aurora pen, by the way. Someone gave 00:05:11.329 --> 00:05:15.810 me in Italy quite a few years ago, but I loved 00:05:15.810 --> 00:05:24.439 the pen. And they've become quite expensive. 00:05:25.100 --> 00:05:30.560 And so I feel funny saying that as a Franciscan. 00:05:30.560 --> 00:05:34.560 Here's my Aurora pen. I should have my little 00:05:34.560 --> 00:05:40.279 big pen here. But anyway, it was sitting there. 00:05:44.319 --> 00:05:50.079 For some reason, I realized that the reason I 00:05:50.079 --> 00:05:55.220 was feeling distant from God and the reason that 00:05:55.220 --> 00:06:00.779 I was kind of drifting was the fact that I hadn't 00:06:00.779 --> 00:06:04.600 written anything, that I hadn't picked up that 00:06:04.600 --> 00:06:14.079 pen. So a poet tends to... use and work with 00:06:14.079 --> 00:06:20.180 concrete things. So the fountain pen became the 00:06:20.180 --> 00:06:25.199 symbol of this whole dilemma of what I should 00:06:25.199 --> 00:06:32.319 do. And so that became the first poem in the 00:06:32.319 --> 00:06:36.680 book here, Fountain Pen. Wonderful. Yeah, I know 00:06:36.680 --> 00:06:38.920 in brainstorming for this episode, we discussed 00:06:38.920 --> 00:06:41.639 you selecting five to seven poems that you can 00:06:41.639 --> 00:06:46.220 read on the podcast today. And yeah, so if you 00:06:46.220 --> 00:06:47.759 want to dive right in, I think that would be 00:06:47.759 --> 00:06:49.459 great. If you want to start with Fountain Pin, 00:06:49.639 --> 00:06:52.000 and then the format of this, we'll just kind 00:06:52.000 --> 00:06:55.720 of talk about the poem afterwards, as you say 00:06:55.720 --> 00:06:58.790 in the preface of the book. how does one speak 00:06:58.790 --> 00:07:01.329 of poems when the poems themselves say everything 00:07:01.329 --> 00:07:05.490 the poet has to say so some some poems come like 00:07:05.490 --> 00:07:07.829 we we may just move on to the next one and just 00:07:07.829 --> 00:07:11.129 let it be what it is and uh invitation for the 00:07:11.129 --> 00:07:13.870 listener to reflect upon it but then others there 00:07:13.870 --> 00:07:16.389 will probably be a backstory or um something 00:07:16.389 --> 00:07:19.750 we can discuss about it so uh but please uh dive 00:07:19.750 --> 00:07:21.569 on into fountain pen and we'll go from there 00:07:21.569 --> 00:07:30.730 okay So here is what eventually came from this 00:07:30.730 --> 00:07:37.110 symbol, this object, the fountain pen. And I 00:07:37.110 --> 00:07:40.610 say this is what eventually came because in poetry, 00:07:40.850 --> 00:07:45.170 some poems come easily. They just flow out of 00:07:45.170 --> 00:07:50.970 you. Others you work and rework. And I don't 00:07:50.970 --> 00:07:57.019 think I reworked this one that much. But it became 00:07:57.019 --> 00:08:02.579 very pivotal because I was very much aware of 00:08:02.579 --> 00:08:09.199 my age. That's three years ago. Four years ago, 00:08:09.240 --> 00:08:12.779 I don't know what it was. I was about 83, 84. 00:08:13.839 --> 00:08:19.220 And so I thought, I can't let that fountain pen 00:08:19.220 --> 00:08:25.000 lie there too much longer. So here's what I came 00:08:25.000 --> 00:08:33.379 up with finally. Fountain pen. I feel these days 00:08:33.379 --> 00:08:41.080 a distance I fear is age intruding. It's voice 00:08:41.080 --> 00:08:49.580 needy, insistent. Rest, pull back, let God find 00:08:49.580 --> 00:08:58.629 you. And so I do. But you keep receding, a stranger 00:08:58.629 --> 00:09:04.990 it seems, to the heart's surrender, until I turn 00:09:04.990 --> 00:09:12.970 to the stilled pen. Closed, it lies unmoving, 00:09:12.970 --> 00:09:18.850 where I left it in search of you, who will come, 00:09:18.929 --> 00:09:25.210 age says. If only I let go, let you surprise 00:09:25.210 --> 00:09:31.529 me. Then when I open the pen, you are there, 00:09:31.730 --> 00:09:39.070 silent, waiting for me to hold you. Let you, 00:09:39.090 --> 00:09:44.830 let your still voice find the waiting words. 00:09:49.580 --> 00:09:53.159 So you can see the fountain pen becomes more 00:09:53.159 --> 00:09:58.039 than an object. You know, I'm relating to it. 00:10:00.500 --> 00:10:05.840 And I move quickly from the first stanza where 00:10:05.840 --> 00:10:09.620 people are saying, rest, pull back, let God find 00:10:09.620 --> 00:10:14.759 you. And then the next stanza, I'm already addressing 00:10:14.759 --> 00:10:22.879 God. And so I do. But you keep receding as if 00:10:22.879 --> 00:10:26.919 God's been listening to this first part and saying 00:10:26.919 --> 00:10:30.860 whatever, you know, whatever's going on. So God 00:10:30.860 --> 00:10:35.539 becomes then, it becomes a dialogue with God, 00:10:35.700 --> 00:10:41.509 which ends up being a dialogue with... with the 00:10:41.509 --> 00:10:44.769 pen as well. He's a part of our little trinity 00:10:44.769 --> 00:10:51.029 of conversation that's going on. So that told 00:10:51.029 --> 00:10:58.090 me, the writing of that poem, that if I keep 00:10:58.090 --> 00:11:03.190 being visited with poems like this, then I think 00:11:03.190 --> 00:11:12.220 I should keep going. And I think I was also motivated 00:11:12.220 --> 00:11:16.740 probably more subconsciously by the fact that 00:11:16.740 --> 00:11:22.480 if I didn't do this, then the book I just did 00:11:22.480 --> 00:11:27.139 is going to be my last book of poetry. And that 00:11:27.139 --> 00:11:30.580 sounded pretty much like death warmed over. I 00:11:30.580 --> 00:11:35.899 said, I think I have more. More little things 00:11:35.899 --> 00:11:40.919 percolating inside that I'm not going to walk 00:11:40.919 --> 00:11:43.759 around saying, well, I did my last book. I better 00:11:43.759 --> 00:11:49.080 die right now. So it made the last book seem 00:11:49.080 --> 00:11:54.759 like a preparation for this next part of the 00:11:54.759 --> 00:11:59.320 journey. I'm very much a person whose whole life 00:11:59.320 --> 00:12:04.809 has been based on journey. The pilgrimage, you 00:12:04.809 --> 00:12:08.610 know, even when I was a little boy, I was five 00:12:08.610 --> 00:12:11.350 years old, I'd take my little suitcase and go 00:12:11.350 --> 00:12:14.789 out to the highway and hitchhike because I wanted 00:12:14.789 --> 00:12:18.110 to go somewhere more than the little town I was 00:12:18.110 --> 00:12:20.769 in. Of course, my dad would have to rush down 00:12:20.769 --> 00:12:25.830 to pick me up. But all that sense of journey 00:12:25.830 --> 00:12:30.450 and being on the journey, and I've traveled extensively 00:12:30.450 --> 00:12:35.580 because of that. And it fit in with my Franciscan 00:12:35.580 --> 00:12:39.860 vocation, which is to be itinerant. We're not 00:12:39.860 --> 00:12:44.639 to be like monks, you know, situated in one place 00:12:44.639 --> 00:12:48.919 our whole life. We are like poor preaching brothers 00:12:48.919 --> 00:12:52.580 of penance. We're on the road. We're itinerant. 00:12:52.679 --> 00:12:55.019 At the beginning of this conversation, you talked 00:12:55.019 --> 00:12:57.740 about how... you you know in the back of your 00:12:57.740 --> 00:13:00.000 mind you're wondering if your previous book was 00:13:00.000 --> 00:13:03.480 going to be your final book of poetry at least 00:13:03.480 --> 00:13:06.039 for a while and then you said you felt a little 00:13:06.039 --> 00:13:08.960 bit distant from god and then you look down at 00:13:08.960 --> 00:13:11.779 your pen this fountain pen and what was that 00:13:11.779 --> 00:13:16.070 process like for you for to to pick up the pen 00:13:16.070 --> 00:13:19.509 again and to write and for these words to just 00:13:19.509 --> 00:13:23.110 flow and for you to kind of step in. You're journeying 00:13:23.110 --> 00:13:26.610 creatively deeper into yourself and then deeper 00:13:26.610 --> 00:13:32.049 into God, correct? Yes. And I was, you know, 00:13:32.090 --> 00:13:36.750 there is something sacred to me about writing 00:13:36.750 --> 00:13:41.789 longhand and not typing. There's something in 00:13:41.789 --> 00:13:45.500 this synapse from the brain. over down the arm 00:13:45.500 --> 00:13:50.080 and in a sense it's like a sculpture as poetry 00:13:50.080 --> 00:13:54.919 slows you down so I'm kind of carving the words 00:13:54.919 --> 00:14:02.440 I'm kind of making of them a sacred object themselves 00:14:02.440 --> 00:14:08.960 on this empty page and so when that is done and 00:14:08.960 --> 00:14:13.309 you've got that whole page finished and you're 00:14:13.309 --> 00:14:18.669 looking at something that was never there before. 00:14:18.889 --> 00:14:23.909 You created something and in this poem in particular, 00:14:24.129 --> 00:14:28.210 God is involved explicitly and so is the pen 00:14:28.210 --> 00:14:31.330 and of course the paper and all the rest. But 00:14:31.330 --> 00:14:38.000 that feeling, I had a feeling of new life. And 00:14:38.000 --> 00:14:44.340 I didn't know what the poems were all going to 00:14:44.340 --> 00:14:49.620 be about. Or are there going to be three poems? 00:14:49.879 --> 00:14:55.100 Or will it keep going? And it kept going depending 00:14:55.100 --> 00:15:01.799 on the circumstances I found myself in. And I 00:15:01.799 --> 00:15:08.279 think after I wrote that poem, I went with one 00:15:08.279 --> 00:15:12.620 of the friars whose family has a cottage about 00:15:12.620 --> 00:15:17.480 two or three hours north of Toronto, Canada. 00:15:17.679 --> 00:15:20.919 So I was up in the Canadian woods in the Bay 00:15:20.919 --> 00:15:28.679 of Bays, and the wind kept blowing. and flowing 00:15:28.679 --> 00:15:32.440 it was that kind of uh i thought and i became 00:15:32.440 --> 00:15:39.820 so aware of wind and uh and i kept thinking of 00:15:39.820 --> 00:15:43.799 that's the way it was in gallup new mexico when 00:15:43.799 --> 00:15:48.639 i was a kid wind wind wind always it's the high 00:15:48.639 --> 00:15:52.980 desert and it's it's it's a thin wind in some 00:15:52.980 --> 00:15:57.080 ways very strong wind but it's the high desert 00:15:57.080 --> 00:16:01.299 so about 7 000 feet so i was already elevated 00:16:01.299 --> 00:16:05.419 as a kid even though it was a desert and and 00:16:05.419 --> 00:16:12.299 i kept thinking about so much of my searching 00:16:12.299 --> 00:16:16.519 for god was in thin air i was always going up 00:16:16.519 --> 00:16:19.659 mountains i was always wanting loving to climb 00:16:19.659 --> 00:16:23.080 mountains i always i know that's my northern 00:16:23.080 --> 00:16:29.899 italian and also my parents, who were from Durango, 00:16:29.980 --> 00:16:33.059 Colorado, and Leadville, Colorado. The mountains 00:16:33.059 --> 00:16:36.679 are right there. My dad worked in Silverton, 00:16:36.779 --> 00:16:42.419 Colorado, in the mines. So I was always in the 00:16:42.419 --> 00:16:47.919 mountains. And so while I was there... I didn't 00:16:47.919 --> 00:16:51.740 plan to read this poem, but it flows right in, 00:16:51.820 --> 00:16:55.940 and then I could go back to the... And that was 00:16:55.940 --> 00:17:01.940 the next significant thing I wrote was, in fact, 00:17:02.039 --> 00:17:08.279 a poem called Thin Air. It's in three parts, 00:17:08.299 --> 00:17:14.299 but I'm reading it because even something as... 00:17:16.490 --> 00:17:23.490 and ephemeral and seemingly untangible, except 00:17:23.490 --> 00:17:28.049 you feel it on you, can become a vehicle for 00:17:28.049 --> 00:17:32.730 something much deeper. And so I wanted to work 00:17:32.730 --> 00:17:36.349 with that. And this really gets into the depth 00:17:36.349 --> 00:17:38.910 of the title of the book, correct? Brother Wind 00:17:38.910 --> 00:17:42.509 and Air. And in fact, my first title was Thin 00:17:42.509 --> 00:17:46.609 Air. And I worked with that for a long time. 00:17:46.730 --> 00:17:50.549 And then I realized that I was working a lot 00:17:50.549 --> 00:17:55.410 with wind and air and the four elements of the 00:17:55.410 --> 00:17:59.089 canticle of the creatures of St. Francis are 00:17:59.089 --> 00:18:05.430 earth, water, air, and fire. And I had written 00:18:05.430 --> 00:18:08.369 a lot about the other elements, but never about 00:18:08.369 --> 00:18:14.950 wind. And so then it also became... a personal 00:18:14.950 --> 00:18:22.450 furthering of my entering into and living the 00:18:22.450 --> 00:18:28.289 canticle of the creatures. So I won't read all 00:18:28.289 --> 00:18:31.769 three parts of this, but I just want to show 00:18:31.769 --> 00:18:35.230 how even dealing with something that ephemeral, 00:18:35.329 --> 00:18:40.619 something will surprise you on the page. And 00:18:40.619 --> 00:18:43.640 you say, oh my goodness, am I glad I started 00:18:43.640 --> 00:18:48.440 this one. And this is, and I'll point that out 00:18:48.440 --> 00:18:53.519 to you. From the time I was a boy, I have reached 00:18:53.519 --> 00:19:00.779 out into thin air, and you are there. You, the 00:19:00.779 --> 00:19:06.869 breathed word I believe I came from. I. this 00:19:06.869 --> 00:19:13.170 embodied soul you breathe. When the air grows 00:19:13.170 --> 00:19:18.789 dense with silence I cannot see, you are there, 00:19:18.990 --> 00:19:27.549 air whisperer, mostly in thin air. But how can 00:19:27.549 --> 00:19:33.289 you fit into thin air? like the small rush of 00:19:33.289 --> 00:19:38.930 air when a rock has rolled back. That was the 00:19:38.930 --> 00:19:45.569 surprise. Also, God becomes the air whisperer, 00:19:45.569 --> 00:19:50.170 and God is breathing me. I'm not breathing God. 00:19:50.289 --> 00:19:53.490 God is breathing me. These are surprises. But 00:19:53.490 --> 00:19:59.690 the big surprise, I said, now I'm going to look 00:19:59.690 --> 00:20:03.630 for a metaphor. No, I didn't. I just said, but 00:20:03.630 --> 00:20:07.690 how can you fit into thin air like the small 00:20:07.690 --> 00:20:11.890 Russia bear? And all of a sudden it just fell 00:20:11.890 --> 00:20:16.210 on the page when a rock has been rolled back. 00:20:16.509 --> 00:20:21.410 So it's a very Easter symbol, the rock being 00:20:21.410 --> 00:20:24.029 rolled back from the tomb. And that Russia bear 00:20:24.029 --> 00:20:26.950 that would come out is also the risen Jesus, 00:20:27.049 --> 00:20:30.009 his spirit breathing. He is in there breathing. 00:20:32.580 --> 00:20:37.559 And that's the surprise. And you don't say, oh, 00:20:37.619 --> 00:20:40.220 my goodness, I wonder what that means. I better 00:20:40.220 --> 00:20:45.759 explain that. And then you ruin it because you 00:20:45.759 --> 00:20:50.539 let it be this very rich symbol. Somebody else 00:20:50.539 --> 00:20:54.339 is going to say, oh, my gosh, yes. And they've 00:20:54.339 --> 00:20:58.539 had an experience. And then they bring that experience. 00:20:59.329 --> 00:21:05.089 to God being this small Russia bear when a rock 00:21:05.089 --> 00:21:11.029 has been rolled back. That's beautiful. I love 00:21:11.029 --> 00:21:13.349 that so much. And I won't ask you to explain 00:21:13.349 --> 00:21:19.269 it, because like you said, the surprise can just 00:21:19.269 --> 00:21:21.730 be what it is. It was a surprise that came to 00:21:21.730 --> 00:21:24.750 you, and it comes to each of us throughout our 00:21:24.750 --> 00:21:30.289 lives. That kept happening in this poem. And 00:21:30.289 --> 00:21:35.049 as I said, and maybe I ought to move to Canada, 00:21:35.069 --> 00:21:40.730 I don't know, but this inspiration kept coming, 00:21:40.750 --> 00:21:45.930 you know, and I thought, well, and then I'll 00:21:45.930 --> 00:21:50.470 show you. And in the third, or is this the fourth? 00:21:51.029 --> 00:21:58.819 Yeah, the fourth section of the poem. Again, 00:21:59.059 --> 00:22:03.019 there was a surprise I would never have anticipated. 00:22:03.819 --> 00:22:07.920 Maybe I have to read the third part to go in 00:22:07.920 --> 00:22:14.880 there. In old age, I am beginning to see poems 00:22:14.880 --> 00:22:21.940 are my way into thin air. Now, that was very 00:22:21.940 --> 00:22:25.789 interesting. They're a portal somehow. They are 00:22:25.789 --> 00:22:33.049 thin air where I find you, weighted words that 00:22:33.049 --> 00:22:40.809 are mostly still silent, weightless, heavy in 00:22:40.809 --> 00:22:46.609 thin air. And then the fourth one begins. Poems 00:22:46.609 --> 00:22:53.170 begin soundless, not heard, till the child in 00:22:53.170 --> 00:23:01.480 me Sounds words walking safe with father. No 00:23:01.480 --> 00:23:07.960 care that he'll be sick in thin air. But asking 00:23:07.960 --> 00:23:13.359 as we climb higher, where is the lamb, father? 00:23:14.680 --> 00:23:18.859 Now that surprised me and blew me right out of 00:23:18.859 --> 00:23:24.009 Canada. I had to hold on to a tree. I said, now, 00:23:24.049 --> 00:23:27.109 where is that coming? All of a sudden, it's Abraham 00:23:27.109 --> 00:23:30.309 and his son and the sacrifice on the mountain. 00:23:31.650 --> 00:23:37.430 And the reason I'm doing this is if you have 00:23:37.430 --> 00:23:40.769 the courage, and the great poets are the ones 00:23:40.769 --> 00:23:43.490 that have the courage to go where all of us stop 00:23:43.490 --> 00:23:46.750 and say, I don't think I want to go any deeper 00:23:46.750 --> 00:23:51.740 here. But this one, it just kept leading me, 00:23:51.799 --> 00:23:57.559 leading me in. And the reason I'm sharing it 00:23:57.559 --> 00:24:01.880 with those of you who are participating with 00:24:01.880 --> 00:24:10.240 this podcast is that it was a surprise to me. 00:24:10.359 --> 00:24:16.700 So if you're surprised when you see this. I was 00:24:16.700 --> 00:24:19.759 just as surprised. It's not something I thought 00:24:19.759 --> 00:24:23.200 out because I have a very great mind. Poetry 00:24:23.200 --> 00:24:25.460 doesn't have much to do with the mind anyway. 00:24:26.019 --> 00:24:30.180 It's more with the heart and with symbols and 00:24:30.180 --> 00:24:36.359 this sort of thing. But it also shows that even 00:24:36.359 --> 00:24:42.220 thin air... if you begin to examine it by feeling 00:24:42.220 --> 00:24:46.180 it, tasting it, hearing it, whatever you're doing 00:24:46.180 --> 00:24:52.559 with it, it will yield, yield treasures of memory, 00:24:52.740 --> 00:24:58.920 of scripture, of the story of salvation, of your 00:24:58.920 --> 00:25:03.849 inner life, of your unconscious. Things you didn't 00:25:03.849 --> 00:25:07.190 know that all of a sudden you remember, oh my 00:25:07.190 --> 00:25:09.809 goodness, that's why I had trouble with this. 00:25:10.089 --> 00:25:13.609 Was I three or four when that happened? You know, 00:25:13.670 --> 00:25:18.910 that kind of thing. So this is kind of an introduction 00:25:18.910 --> 00:25:24.210 then too to those surprises that I want to talk 00:25:24.210 --> 00:25:30.390 more about as we look at a few more poems here. 00:25:31.940 --> 00:25:34.519 Please, yeah. You have another one for us? I 00:25:34.519 --> 00:25:41.579 do. And it's another one that fits in with the 00:25:41.579 --> 00:25:47.519 poem, the fountain pen, and why I wrote this 00:25:47.519 --> 00:25:52.039 book, but more importantly, why I write, period. 00:25:53.220 --> 00:25:56.819 And that's the title of the poem, Why I Write? 00:25:56.819 --> 00:26:01.660 That is the title of the poem, Why I Write. So 00:26:01.660 --> 00:26:10.140 again, it will talk in more concrete terms. I 00:26:10.140 --> 00:26:16.279 closed the old man and the sea, strode to the 00:26:16.279 --> 00:26:21.519 ball field unafraid, and played baseball confidently, 00:26:22.019 --> 00:26:29.440 scoring a few worthy runs. It was something inside 00:26:29.440 --> 00:26:34.299 the old fisherman, something inside his words 00:26:34.299 --> 00:26:39.599 that moved like music and stirred something inside 00:26:39.599 --> 00:26:46.599 me. It became my spirit alive. I was the words 00:26:46.599 --> 00:26:53.180 I had read. I was a poem singing. I was the dance 00:26:53.180 --> 00:26:59.700 of music. I was grace and poise and longed to 00:26:59.700 --> 00:27:04.839 find words like Hemingway's to keep me from falling 00:27:04.839 --> 00:27:15.240 down. I began to write my own. They give me what 00:27:15.240 --> 00:27:21.059 I don't know is there to know in me and everywhere. 00:27:23.660 --> 00:27:31.519 So. I've always been attracted to Hemingway's 00:27:31.519 --> 00:27:37.980 writing. He's the closest prose writer for me 00:27:37.980 --> 00:27:43.559 to poetry. And because of his reverence for every 00:27:43.559 --> 00:27:49.299 word, and he does make it as short as possible. 00:27:51.440 --> 00:27:55.440 But there is a music behind the words, a sound. 00:27:56.079 --> 00:28:07.799 There is a feel that sets my spirit to dancing, 00:28:08.079 --> 00:28:15.619 to singing, and it is in the sound. that I began 00:28:15.619 --> 00:28:20.019 to feel the truth inside the words and behind 00:28:20.019 --> 00:28:26.880 the words. I can paraphrase Hemingway and, you 00:28:26.880 --> 00:28:32.259 know, you'll just fall down totally bored. But 00:28:32.259 --> 00:28:35.259 if you get his exact words and you read them, 00:28:35.400 --> 00:28:39.160 there is a music to them that all of a sudden 00:28:39.160 --> 00:28:46.390 you're inside. I know that sounds mystical, and 00:28:46.390 --> 00:28:52.170 in a sense it is, because mystical comes from 00:28:52.170 --> 00:28:56.029 the word mystery. And so what is the mystery? 00:28:56.190 --> 00:29:00.509 Why does that happen? Well, I love, I mean, that 00:29:00.509 --> 00:29:03.710 stanza is one of my, probably my favorite in 00:29:03.710 --> 00:29:06.549 the book, that I became my spirit alive. I was 00:29:06.549 --> 00:29:10.200 the words I had read. I was a poem singing. I 00:29:10.200 --> 00:29:13.680 was the dance of music. You can feel the movement 00:29:13.680 --> 00:29:19.539 of these words, just like you said, God breathing 00:29:19.539 --> 00:29:23.119 in you and through you, through language, through 00:29:23.119 --> 00:29:28.420 art, through words, and it's as if you're, you 00:29:28.420 --> 00:29:31.640 can just feel this aliveness in that poem and 00:29:31.640 --> 00:29:34.019 the words taking you there, Hemingway taking 00:29:34.019 --> 00:29:39.200 you there. And in the book, in their poem and 00:29:39.200 --> 00:29:43.940 the experience was from a memory from college. 00:29:44.259 --> 00:29:47.559 Because those of you who know me know I'm not 00:29:47.559 --> 00:29:50.460 the greatest athlete who ever lived. In fact, 00:29:50.660 --> 00:29:53.339 I was the kid that was afraid he was going to 00:29:53.339 --> 00:29:56.319 be chosen. But they always put me in right field. 00:29:59.180 --> 00:30:01.880 Because I was going to miss the ball, et cetera, 00:30:01.920 --> 00:30:06.240 et cetera. And this is based on a very real experience. 00:30:06.960 --> 00:30:10.920 I spent the afternoon reading The Old Man and 00:30:10.920 --> 00:30:14.299 the Sea, maybe a whole day. And I came out of 00:30:14.299 --> 00:30:18.240 that. I was more than myself. I was myself enhanced. 00:30:18.839 --> 00:30:25.029 I was myself freed. And I went. Most of the other 00:30:25.029 --> 00:30:27.690 friars who were playing with me, they fainted. 00:30:27.690 --> 00:30:29.930 They couldn't believe I hit the ball for one 00:30:29.930 --> 00:30:35.529 thing. But I was really playing. And so I think 00:30:35.529 --> 00:30:39.609 that art, poetry, dance, sculpture, whatever 00:30:39.609 --> 00:30:46.630 it is, if you can find a way into it, it will... 00:30:47.420 --> 00:30:51.759 Do something to your own spirit that is atypical 00:30:51.759 --> 00:30:58.099 of you. Give you gifts that you're very grateful 00:30:58.099 --> 00:31:03.819 for. Well, I mean, that's the first two lines 00:31:03.819 --> 00:31:05.759 of the poem, right? I mean, I closed the old 00:31:05.759 --> 00:31:08.740 man in the sea, and then I love this line, strode 00:31:08.740 --> 00:31:12.779 to the ball field unafraid. Unafraid. So, I mean, 00:31:12.819 --> 00:31:17.579 it's just such this... To me, I receive it as 00:31:17.579 --> 00:31:22.599 an invitation to, hey, let what you find beautiful 00:31:22.599 --> 00:31:27.480 to take you in. I'm an artist too, so I love 00:31:27.480 --> 00:31:31.220 words, language, but let it take you in, and 00:31:31.220 --> 00:31:34.710 in that presence. And in that, just completely 00:31:34.710 --> 00:31:38.750 being absorbed in this thing, captivated by this 00:31:38.750 --> 00:31:41.630 thing that you find beautiful, maybe some of 00:31:41.630 --> 00:31:43.829 those insecurities, maybe some of those fears, 00:31:44.029 --> 00:31:47.930 maybe they drift away a little bit. Maybe you 00:31:47.930 --> 00:31:50.470 feel more free. Maybe you score a couple runs. 00:31:51.890 --> 00:31:58.319 Exactly. Yeah. Robert Frost, he defined a poem 00:31:58.319 --> 00:32:03.819 once as a momentary stay against confusion. That's 00:32:03.819 --> 00:32:08.400 very mind -oriented. And it will do that too. 00:32:08.579 --> 00:32:12.049 It can sometimes straighten your... brain out. 00:32:12.289 --> 00:32:15.529 You know, it's brain, you're all confused and 00:32:15.529 --> 00:32:21.309 the poem will do that for you. But this one was 00:32:21.309 --> 00:32:26.009 much more emotional, much more holistic, this 00:32:26.009 --> 00:32:32.230 experience. It's why people read some books over 00:32:32.230 --> 00:32:35.430 and over again. Every year they'll read certain 00:32:35.430 --> 00:32:40.369 books because it's like it was written for me. 00:32:40.940 --> 00:32:44.099 Or was written for you. Yeah, I love it. Got 00:32:44.099 --> 00:32:48.480 another one for us? I'm going to make you read 00:32:48.480 --> 00:32:50.740 the whole book. Let's start at the beginning 00:32:50.740 --> 00:32:54.539 and do the whole book. As you can see, so far, 00:32:54.539 --> 00:33:02.539 I'm sure, words are really important to me. I 00:33:02.539 --> 00:33:07.819 love to play with words. I've always been intrigued 00:33:07.819 --> 00:33:21.450 by words. And so naturally, if I'm exploring 00:33:21.450 --> 00:33:28.049 why I write, and this book is a lot about writing 00:33:28.049 --> 00:33:33.849 and the writing of poems and why, that I am going 00:33:33.849 --> 00:33:40.460 to have to eventually talk about words themselves. 00:33:41.079 --> 00:33:46.880 And this poem that I'm going to read now is called 00:33:46.880 --> 00:33:55.420 Thunder and Rain. And it's a memory also. I was 00:33:55.420 --> 00:33:59.519 somewhere and it was a terrible thunder and lightning 00:33:59.519 --> 00:34:05.680 and I remembered it brought back the memory. 00:34:06.490 --> 00:34:12.130 how fearful I was of thunder when I was a little 00:34:12.130 --> 00:34:16.670 kid because my mother had to work and my dad 00:34:16.670 --> 00:34:22.809 had to work and and one of my aunts took care 00:34:22.809 --> 00:34:29.829 of me when I was a baby and so she was deathly 00:34:29.829 --> 00:34:33.389 afraid of thunder and every time thunder happened 00:34:33.389 --> 00:34:36.769 she would grab me and run around the house screaming 00:34:36.769 --> 00:34:42.170 about thunder and so i i then picked up that 00:34:42.170 --> 00:34:46.329 fear and i was i would when when i was there 00:34:46.329 --> 00:34:50.690 with my mom and dad i would say oh my my my asunda 00:34:50.690 --> 00:34:54.590 sunda you know that in my baby talk sundays come 00:34:54.590 --> 00:34:57.010 in they're looking at me what what's this you 00:34:57.010 --> 00:34:59.630 know then the thunder would start i was like 00:34:59.630 --> 00:35:04.409 a dog that can sense thunder coming i had to 00:35:04.409 --> 00:35:09.610 hide so anyway so but but the poem opened up 00:35:09.610 --> 00:35:14.170 a a lot more than that memory and it's called 00:35:14.170 --> 00:35:23.150 thunder and rain The first word I spoke that 00:35:23.150 --> 00:35:31.690 I remember is thunder. Sunda, Mommy, Sunda. And 00:35:31.690 --> 00:35:35.389 she'd scoop me up, and it would start to rain. 00:35:36.969 --> 00:35:43.469 Did scary Sunda bring the rain that tapped its 00:35:43.469 --> 00:35:48.460 song on the tin roof of the small house? where 00:35:48.460 --> 00:35:54.780 we lived in Durango, Colorado. I like to think 00:35:54.780 --> 00:35:59.480 the little boy stopped being afraid of thunder 00:35:59.480 --> 00:36:05.460 when he understood that sanda could mean bad 00:36:05.460 --> 00:36:13.179 noise and singing rain. One word could mean something 00:36:13.179 --> 00:36:20.869 bad, but also fill pools where he splashed and 00:36:20.869 --> 00:36:28.150 played fishing with his dad. Words became fun 00:36:28.150 --> 00:36:37.349 to play with. So all that ambiguity and then 00:36:37.349 --> 00:36:41.289 that you had the text in front of you, I said, 00:36:41.329 --> 00:36:44.670 and played fishing. which is another word, so 00:36:44.670 --> 00:36:48.449 I put quotes around the word to emphasize that 00:36:48.449 --> 00:36:54.849 that was another rich word. And because my dad 00:36:54.849 --> 00:36:58.510 was a fly fisherman, lived for, died for, and 00:36:58.510 --> 00:37:05.909 everything was fly fishing. And when I look back 00:37:05.909 --> 00:37:10.170 on my collected poems, there are so many fishing 00:37:10.170 --> 00:37:18.130 images. and fish images that came from what my 00:37:18.130 --> 00:37:23.329 dad loved and that I played with him. I would 00:37:23.329 --> 00:37:25.949 play in the pool that I'm fishing and he would, 00:37:25.969 --> 00:37:29.550 you know, tell me what kind of fish I'm catching 00:37:29.550 --> 00:37:35.889 and all of that, usually trout. So anyway, what... 00:37:36.489 --> 00:37:40.449 What I remembered was my first word. I think 00:37:40.449 --> 00:37:44.929 that was my first word. Sunda for thunder. I'm 00:37:44.929 --> 00:37:47.769 sure there were words before that, but that's 00:37:47.769 --> 00:37:51.070 the one I remember, which is interesting that 00:37:51.070 --> 00:37:57.550 I would remember something scary. And I don't 00:37:57.550 --> 00:38:02.889 remember when that fear left. But then I hypothesize 00:38:02.889 --> 00:38:07.199 in the poem that it must have been. when my little 00:38:07.199 --> 00:38:11.539 mind figured out, well, thunder's also good because 00:38:11.539 --> 00:38:14.480 it brings the rain. And I've always loved rain. 00:38:14.679 --> 00:38:17.820 I've loved the sound of rain, the smell of rain. 00:38:18.380 --> 00:38:25.300 I was just shocked back into that reality three 00:38:25.300 --> 00:38:31.570 weeks ago. Well, yeah, three weeks ago is when 00:38:31.570 --> 00:38:35.070 I was shocked back into the reality. But I just 00:38:35.070 --> 00:38:39.829 got through a period of COVID, the longer COVID, 00:38:39.949 --> 00:38:46.230 where every organ in your body is attacked. It 00:38:46.230 --> 00:38:51.469 was horrible. I've had COVID before, but nothing 00:38:51.469 --> 00:38:58.509 like this. It was actually very terrifying. So 00:38:58.509 --> 00:39:03.670 when I got well enough, I was in my hermitage, 00:39:03.690 --> 00:39:08.630 which is in Florida. And so I have my car there 00:39:08.630 --> 00:39:13.750 and everything because I'm a rich Franciscan. 00:39:13.849 --> 00:39:22.250 I needed transportation. So anyway, but I was 00:39:22.250 --> 00:39:26.489 quite unsure. I did stay an extra week after. 00:39:27.119 --> 00:39:35.500 the COVID experience, but I needed somebody to 00:39:35.500 --> 00:39:39.260 help me drive. And one of my former students 00:39:39.260 --> 00:39:44.739 came down and helped me drive back. And we were 00:39:44.739 --> 00:39:53.219 driving up towards Columbus, Georgia, which is 00:39:53.219 --> 00:39:57.800 near Plains, Georgia. You know, so it's where 00:39:57.800 --> 00:40:05.360 Jimmy Carter lived, where he died. And there 00:40:05.360 --> 00:40:13.699 was a rain and the rain had just finished. And 00:40:13.699 --> 00:40:16.820 I remember saying, Michael and Michael, put the 00:40:16.820 --> 00:40:21.440 windows down. I smell the rain. And when I had 00:40:21.440 --> 00:40:31.380 COVID. I couldn't smell or taste. So it was like 00:40:31.380 --> 00:40:37.059 I was a child. I couldn't get enough rain. I 00:40:37.059 --> 00:40:39.239 thought he was going to have to rein me in. I 00:40:39.239 --> 00:40:42.159 was like a dog with my head out the window trying 00:40:42.159 --> 00:40:48.179 to smell the rain, taste the rain, feel the rain, 00:40:48.360 --> 00:40:56.860 you know, grass and all of that. So that's a 00:40:56.860 --> 00:41:04.659 similar experience. That deprivation and that 00:41:04.659 --> 00:41:09.159 fear that that was not going to go away, that 00:41:09.159 --> 00:41:15.460 I couldn't taste or smell or whatever. It was 00:41:15.460 --> 00:41:20.130 like this gift out of heaven. I haven't written 00:41:20.130 --> 00:41:23.570 anything yet. I'm too close to the experience. 00:41:23.969 --> 00:41:27.530 And that's the other thing you have to be careful 00:41:27.530 --> 00:41:31.630 of. If you're too close to the experience, then 00:41:31.630 --> 00:41:35.409 it becomes a mind thing. You start explaining. 00:41:35.610 --> 00:41:40.550 You start doing what I just did. And that's out 00:41:40.550 --> 00:41:44.989 of form. Yeah. Yeah. Mary Carr says that about 00:41:44.989 --> 00:41:47.469 memoir, too, is that from the period of time 00:41:47.469 --> 00:41:49.750 you're writing about, you should really be, I 00:41:49.750 --> 00:41:52.150 think she says, seven years removed from that 00:41:52.150 --> 00:41:55.869 experience so that you have more perspective. 00:41:56.550 --> 00:41:58.929 Sure. But then also it's what you said, like 00:41:58.929 --> 00:42:03.269 you can get back into the heart in a level way 00:42:03.269 --> 00:42:06.489 rather than just staying up here and trying to 00:42:06.489 --> 00:42:09.170 make sense of the experience cerebrally. You 00:42:09.170 --> 00:42:13.710 know, you have the luxury of time and space to 00:42:13.710 --> 00:42:18.110 really see the experience as it is. And then 00:42:18.110 --> 00:42:21.409 you can, weirdly enough, then you can go back 00:42:21.409 --> 00:42:25.889 into it. Yes, yeah. That's very true. And it 00:42:25.889 --> 00:42:29.190 probably would be when you're not thinking of 00:42:29.190 --> 00:42:33.230 it at all. Well, I love Thunder and Rain so much. 00:42:33.309 --> 00:42:37.739 I mean, yeah, it's very... having a three -year 00:42:37.739 --> 00:42:41.380 -old and a nine -month -old I mean it's probably 00:42:41.380 --> 00:42:44.630 so true that for each of us like some of our 00:42:44.630 --> 00:42:47.989 first memories are probably associated with fear 00:42:47.989 --> 00:42:50.710 in some way because it really sticks out. But 00:42:50.710 --> 00:42:53.489 then I love the movement of this poem that the 00:42:53.489 --> 00:42:57.030 Sunda leads to this opening of, Oh, the rain 00:42:57.030 --> 00:43:01.530 sings to me as well when Sunda comes and I get 00:43:01.530 --> 00:43:05.110 to, I get to play with dad when Sunda comes. 00:43:05.230 --> 00:43:09.010 So it's such a human poem to me where this thing 00:43:09.010 --> 00:43:12.530 that begins with fear, it's taking you into, 00:43:13.309 --> 00:43:21.909 play in song as well. Yeah, it's beautiful. Ready 00:43:21.909 --> 00:43:27.690 for another one? So again, in this memory thing, 00:43:27.989 --> 00:43:34.190 I want to look at another playing poem called 00:43:34.190 --> 00:43:42.349 Playing at Solar Eclipse. We just had a solar 00:43:42.349 --> 00:43:45.090 eclipse. eclipse the last few years, right? It 00:43:45.090 --> 00:43:50.349 was two or three years ago. And that became, 00:43:50.650 --> 00:43:56.050 you know, you know how you hear on the news or 00:43:56.050 --> 00:43:58.289 you see there's going to be a solar eclipse and 00:43:58.289 --> 00:44:01.030 you better not look into the sun and everything. 00:44:01.349 --> 00:44:05.210 And I was thinking of all of that. And I said, 00:44:05.269 --> 00:44:09.210 well, at my age, I better listen to that. And 00:44:09.210 --> 00:44:14.230 so I was I came into my room, or I am now into 00:44:14.230 --> 00:44:21.750 my friary room, and something happened that made 00:44:21.750 --> 00:44:29.309 that particular solar eclipse an experience that 00:44:29.309 --> 00:44:34.030 I had forgotten about and an experience totally 00:44:34.030 --> 00:44:37.469 other than I thought I was going to have with 00:44:37.469 --> 00:44:50.449 the solar eclipse. Some poems start in drama, 00:44:50.769 --> 00:44:55.050 Shakespeare drama sort of thing, where something 00:44:55.050 --> 00:44:58.329 starts in the middle of everything. Something's 00:44:58.329 --> 00:45:02.369 been happening, and then you start the narrative. 00:45:03.599 --> 00:45:09.460 as they say in Latin, in medias res, in the middle 00:45:09.460 --> 00:45:13.840 of things. So this has a medias res in the starting. 00:45:15.579 --> 00:45:22.239 Playing at solar eclipse. As exciting as it was, 00:45:22.440 --> 00:45:29.480 it was even more so because I used what I used 00:45:29.480 --> 00:45:35.449 as a boy. A cardboard pinhole white paper toy. 00:45:38.630 --> 00:45:43.829 Afterwards, I turned on TV. It'll be 20 years. 00:45:44.230 --> 00:45:49.429 This is a quote. You'll see it on the page because 00:45:49.429 --> 00:45:53.530 it's got somebody speaking on the TV. It'll be 00:45:53.530 --> 00:45:59.230 20 years before you see the next eclipse. I'll 00:45:59.230 --> 00:46:07.150 be 106. Grrr. Why does TV have to fix and twist 00:46:07.150 --> 00:46:12.449 what is fun so we'll have something bad to feel 00:46:12.449 --> 00:46:18.289 from their future projections? Let's just play 00:46:18.289 --> 00:46:24.489 and make connections. Like how I, wanting to 00:46:24.489 --> 00:46:28.929 be a boy, remembered how to make a toy and how 00:46:28.929 --> 00:46:33.420 it still works. and why it made me a grateful 00:46:33.420 --> 00:46:38.800 old guy, smiling that a boy who was ornery still 00:46:38.800 --> 00:46:45.139 knows his astronomy. So, of course, it's using 00:46:45.139 --> 00:46:48.460 the pinhole, and it was an interesting thing 00:46:48.460 --> 00:46:54.760 because my Venetian blind had a hole in it, in 00:46:54.760 --> 00:46:59.960 one of the blades of the thing. That sun was 00:46:59.960 --> 00:47:04.780 coming in and it was on the floor. And so I didn't 00:47:04.780 --> 00:47:07.000 have to do anything. I didn't have to go get 00:47:07.000 --> 00:47:10.159 a piece of cardboard, make a hole in it, and 00:47:10.159 --> 00:47:13.199 then hold it so on the floor you can see the 00:47:13.199 --> 00:47:17.420 eclipse. I saw the whole eclipse all the way 00:47:17.420 --> 00:47:19.940 until it was nothing and then coming back again 00:47:19.940 --> 00:47:24.900 through my own clinician blinds. I wanted this 00:47:24.900 --> 00:47:34.369 poem to be... because I was having fun doing 00:47:34.369 --> 00:47:38.969 this. And one of the ways you can be playful 00:47:38.969 --> 00:47:45.489 is using rhyme and using words that sound the 00:47:45.489 --> 00:47:50.710 same. So this poem is filled with end rhyme. 00:47:51.110 --> 00:47:57.309 Like, as exciting as it was, It was even more 00:47:57.309 --> 00:48:03.469 so because, so was because. I used what I used 00:48:03.469 --> 00:48:08.550 as a boy, a cardboard pinhole white paper toy, 00:48:08.789 --> 00:48:14.409 boy toy. So I'm playing with words here. Consciously, 00:48:14.409 --> 00:48:18.829 you know, I'm consciously doing this. Afterwards, 00:48:18.989 --> 00:48:23.880 I turned on TV. It'll be 20 years before you 00:48:23.880 --> 00:48:28.960 see the next eclipse. So now I had to have even 00:48:28.960 --> 00:48:34.500 an inside, an inner rhyme, because it gets serious. 00:48:35.920 --> 00:48:40.280 Before you see the next eclipse, I'll be 106. 00:48:40.579 --> 00:48:44.340 So those two half rhymes, it's a broken rhyme, 00:48:44.699 --> 00:48:50.739 eclipse and 106. Why does TV have to fix and 00:48:50.739 --> 00:48:56.639 twist? I'm using six, eclipse, fix, twist, because 00:48:56.639 --> 00:49:00.940 everything got twisted in my mind. I can't even 00:49:00.940 --> 00:49:04.900 play now without thinking that I'll be dead and 00:49:04.900 --> 00:49:09.260 I better get this right now. I play really well 00:49:09.260 --> 00:49:14.320 now. So the words themselves should twist and 00:49:14.320 --> 00:49:21.679 be twisted somehow. And so at the end, of course, 00:49:21.860 --> 00:49:26.480 there's a half rhyme when you're smiling that 00:49:26.480 --> 00:49:30.539 a boy who was ornery still knows his astronomy. 00:49:32.219 --> 00:49:35.780 Yeah. Well, I love that line. Let's just play 00:49:35.780 --> 00:49:40.079 and make connections. Yeah. Can we just do that? 00:49:40.119 --> 00:49:45.820 Can we just do that? And it's, of course, tongue 00:49:45.820 --> 00:49:54.449 in cheek. the whole poem. That's a very light 00:49:54.449 --> 00:49:58.250 poem. I appreciated you walking us through the 00:49:58.250 --> 00:50:01.809 rhyme, though, because when I first read it, 00:50:01.929 --> 00:50:08.289 I could feel it in the sound, but I did not realize 00:50:08.289 --> 00:50:13.690 that when the TV comes on and you're forced to 00:50:13.690 --> 00:50:17.539 confront this pretty, you know, dark reality, 00:50:17.719 --> 00:50:21.360 um, like now, now the rhyming becomes kind of 00:50:21.360 --> 00:50:24.519 fractured, you know, like it, it loses its beat 00:50:24.519 --> 00:50:27.739 a little bit. Um, and then you get back to play, 00:50:27.840 --> 00:50:30.840 you get back to making connections in it. It 00:50:30.840 --> 00:50:34.739 gets back to, um, how it began, uh, with this 00:50:34.739 --> 00:50:38.659 childlike play enjoyment. Uh, so I appreciate 00:50:38.659 --> 00:50:41.340 you walking us through that. You, you are a master 00:50:41.340 --> 00:50:48.719 of sound. Now, that's something that because 00:50:48.719 --> 00:50:53.480 I've written so much poetry and that I know poetry, 00:50:53.739 --> 00:50:56.599 the mechanics and that sort of thing, that I 00:50:56.599 --> 00:51:00.920 did rather consciously. But I didn't pick the 00:51:00.920 --> 00:51:05.039 words. The words were surprises to me. Fixed, 00:51:05.039 --> 00:51:12.980 twist. 106. 106, you know. And that was a surprise 00:51:12.980 --> 00:51:16.849 because, yes. It would be 106. I thought, oh 00:51:16.849 --> 00:51:20.309 my gosh, that made it even worse. So I had to 00:51:20.309 --> 00:51:24.150 get back to playing, you know, towards the end 00:51:24.150 --> 00:51:29.130 of the poem. Those are kind of the finer things, 00:51:29.369 --> 00:51:32.269 finer points of poetry, the mechanics and that 00:51:32.269 --> 00:51:36.289 sort of thing. But when they work, they contribute 00:51:36.289 --> 00:51:43.099 just beautifully to the whole experience. Now, 00:51:43.119 --> 00:51:48.420 that's a real play -play thing. I'm going to 00:51:48.420 --> 00:51:56.300 juxtapose that to a poem which I didn't intend 00:51:56.300 --> 00:51:59.920 to do, but when I was looking at things this 00:51:59.920 --> 00:52:05.639 morning, I said, I better include this poem on 00:52:05.639 --> 00:52:15.639 page 75. again, a memory and an illuminated miniature. 00:52:17.599 --> 00:52:23.260 When I was a boy living in New Mexico, in Gallup, 00:52:23.300 --> 00:52:28.000 New Mexico, my dad was away at the war in Saipan 00:52:28.000 --> 00:52:35.739 in Japan. And I'm an only child, so my mother 00:52:35.739 --> 00:52:43.980 and I were living in Gallup, which is maybe a 00:52:43.980 --> 00:52:47.780 couple hundred miles away from where they tested 00:52:47.780 --> 00:52:52.619 the first atomic bomb at White Sands, New Mexico. 00:52:53.400 --> 00:53:00.059 And we could feel that in the house. And so could 00:53:00.059 --> 00:53:03.980 people around their windows rattled. And so, 00:53:04.000 --> 00:53:08.079 of course, the papers are... And the news was 00:53:08.079 --> 00:53:10.960 all about the government's investigating, can't 00:53:10.960 --> 00:53:14.000 figure out what's going on, but not to worry. 00:53:15.760 --> 00:53:20.400 Some of the cattle, they can't milk them. They 00:53:20.400 --> 00:53:23.900 seem to not be able to give milk and all that 00:53:23.900 --> 00:53:29.179 kind of stuff. But it was one of those memories 00:53:29.179 --> 00:53:34.619 that looked, I didn't know how to open it up. 00:53:34.909 --> 00:53:39.610 So I've done so much medieval work with manuscripts 00:53:39.610 --> 00:53:43.130 and that sort of stuff. A miniature is a little 00:53:43.130 --> 00:53:45.909 painting, you know, becomes part of a letter 00:53:45.909 --> 00:53:52.889 on a page, a miniature painting. So I called 00:53:52.889 --> 00:53:59.190 this, and this was a surprise too, an illuminated 00:53:59.190 --> 00:54:04.809 miniature. I'm using that illuminated. It's double 00:54:04.809 --> 00:54:08.550 meaning because the atomic bomb illumines, but 00:54:08.550 --> 00:54:13.710 it also darkens things. So that's where I got 00:54:13.710 --> 00:54:18.630 the title. And it's, oh, it's Illuminated Miniature, 00:54:18.670 --> 00:54:30.019 July 16, 1945, Gallup, New Mexico. And I try 00:54:30.019 --> 00:54:34.340 to keep the image of a page of a manuscript that 00:54:34.340 --> 00:54:40.199 has become little for me in memory. The illuminated 00:54:40.199 --> 00:54:46.539 air grows beyond the yellow page of memory. Its 00:54:46.539 --> 00:54:53.619 mushroom cloud clogs his shallow breathing. It 00:54:53.619 --> 00:54:58.699 is morning and still dark. The windows rattle 00:54:58.699 --> 00:55:04.239 him awake. Mother is in the kitchen. Dad fights 00:55:04.239 --> 00:55:10.639 in far -off Saipan. Three hundred miles away, 00:55:10.760 --> 00:55:16.619 light darkens his room. His waking. He holds 00:55:16.619 --> 00:55:22.599 his breath. Will the earth swallow them? He's 00:55:22.599 --> 00:55:29.820 eight years old. The evening news says, ranchers 00:55:29.820 --> 00:55:40.920 say cows won't milk in white sands. Sometimes 00:55:40.920 --> 00:55:45.860 when you, as a poet or as a writer or whatever, 00:55:46.199 --> 00:55:54.480 you realize that you wrote something rather dark. 00:55:55.980 --> 00:56:02.159 that mirrors something else that was rather dark. 00:56:03.039 --> 00:56:07.179 And all of a sudden, we have Sunda coming back. 00:56:07.400 --> 00:56:11.239 But I'm older, and I'm frightened by... I didn't 00:56:11.239 --> 00:56:13.099 know anything about atomic bombs or anything 00:56:13.099 --> 00:56:17.739 else. But this unknown thing was there that everybody 00:56:17.739 --> 00:56:23.159 seems upset about. I don't think I was. At eight, 00:56:23.219 --> 00:56:27.760 I wouldn't have been. unless I knew what it was. 00:56:28.920 --> 00:56:33.840 Yeah, and in your young mind, you're connecting 00:56:33.840 --> 00:56:37.860 it to your dad being away in Japan. Yeah, I mean, 00:56:37.860 --> 00:56:43.880 there's so much there. Yeah, and that was a huge 00:56:43.880 --> 00:56:53.070 experience for me that my dad was gone. And so 00:56:53.070 --> 00:56:59.309 I will read another poem that illuminates this 00:56:59.309 --> 00:57:05.050 one. And this is Snow Christmas Morning. It's 00:57:05.050 --> 00:57:10.250 on page 77. If you have a book and you're looking 00:57:10.250 --> 00:57:15.750 at it, it's page 77. Here is the book, by the 00:57:15.750 --> 00:57:19.150 way. Isn't that a beautiful book? It really is. 00:57:19.329 --> 00:57:24.909 I just love the cover. I was so blessed. Sometimes, 00:57:25.190 --> 00:57:29.050 you know, you dread the book coming out because 00:57:29.050 --> 00:57:30.610 you don't know what it's going to look like. 00:57:30.730 --> 00:57:34.710 But this is really a beautiful cover and a tribute 00:57:34.710 --> 00:57:39.389 to the artist, the designer. So this one now 00:57:39.389 --> 00:57:46.670 is Snow Christmas Morning. It's Christmas dawn 00:57:46.670 --> 00:57:55.239 in Gallup, 1945. big flakes, and I'm in wonder 00:57:55.239 --> 00:58:05.099 as snow covers the war and dad in Japan. I walk 00:58:05.099 --> 00:58:11.739 out into the snow unprepared as I am, light fishing 00:58:11.739 --> 00:58:17.659 clothes and a flimsy jacket with only wonder 00:58:17.659 --> 00:58:24.289 to clothe me In grace enough for walking above 00:58:24.289 --> 00:58:36.489 the earth, wings lifting me toward Japan. So, 00:58:36.570 --> 00:58:38.969 of course, that's a very emotional poem, very 00:58:38.969 --> 00:58:43.070 loaded, loaded poem. You'll notice it's fishing 00:58:43.070 --> 00:58:49.110 clothes. Yes. I'm wearing fishing clothes in 00:58:49.110 --> 00:58:52.829 winter at Christmas. It's like you're just trying 00:58:52.829 --> 00:58:57.969 to feel close to your dad. Yeah. Wearing something 00:58:57.969 --> 00:59:00.849 that you would wear when you did one of your 00:59:00.849 --> 00:59:02.449 favorite things together. That's right, yeah. 00:59:04.250 --> 00:59:09.929 And there's a lot about clothing me, like clothing 00:59:09.929 --> 00:59:13.829 me in grace enough for walking above the earth. 00:59:13.989 --> 00:59:17.880 You need... a lot of grace to make this happen. 00:59:18.420 --> 00:59:27.880 And not just grace as a supernatural virtue and 00:59:27.880 --> 00:59:36.420 reality, but grace in a Hemingway sense almost. 00:59:36.559 --> 00:59:43.309 He said, courage is grace under pressure. Courage 00:59:43.309 --> 00:59:47.610 is grace under pressure. And so here, the little 00:59:47.610 --> 00:59:51.469 kid's trying to be very brave, but he does want 00:59:51.469 --> 00:59:56.230 to go. And his wings lifting me toward Japan. 00:59:56.929 --> 01:00:04.630 So again, there's darkness there, but this one, 01:00:04.690 --> 01:00:09.989 there's something touching about this poem. You 01:00:09.989 --> 01:00:14.619 feel... Just reading it, I felt I was the little 01:00:14.619 --> 01:00:17.300 boy. Of course, I was the little boy, but I was 01:00:17.300 --> 01:00:19.679 the little boy in the experience, but not in 01:00:19.679 --> 01:00:24.079 the poem. It's recreated, and I really felt with 01:00:24.079 --> 01:00:31.280 and for this little boy. And there's a lot of 01:00:31.280 --> 01:00:38.940 side memories and other memories that came together 01:00:38.940 --> 01:00:42.099 in the writing of this book. because my dad was 01:00:42.099 --> 01:00:48.579 a miner in his younger life. And then towards 01:00:48.579 --> 01:00:53.079 the end, when he returned from over there, one 01:00:53.079 --> 01:00:57.679 of his mining friends got into uranium mining. 01:00:58.079 --> 01:01:03.179 And so my dad would help him fly over parts of 01:01:03.179 --> 01:01:06.059 New Mexico with a Geiger powder. They had a little 01:01:06.059 --> 01:01:16.059 plane. Sunda, mining, caves, darkness. There 01:01:16.059 --> 01:01:19.940 are poems like that that come through here in 01:01:19.940 --> 01:01:24.019 different modes and different sounds. And so 01:01:24.019 --> 01:01:27.360 I have one more that will have one more sound 01:01:27.360 --> 01:01:32.739 that's associated with wind and air. And that 01:01:32.739 --> 01:01:39.260 is the poem, Fast Moving Desert Clouds. That's 01:01:39.260 --> 01:01:52.599 a hundred and seventeen if you have a book. Fast 01:01:52.599 --> 01:02:00.840 Moving Desert Clouds All the empty clouds loud 01:02:00.840 --> 01:02:06.000 still with their empty yin. Fast moving. over 01:02:06.000 --> 01:02:11.519 the desert floor till there was the empty road 01:02:11.519 --> 01:02:17.119 where we'd crossed the continental divide between 01:02:17.119 --> 01:02:22.760 Gallup Air and the Grant's uranium mine, air 01:02:22.760 --> 01:02:28.900 full of my childish fear of the imagined high 01:02:28.900 --> 01:02:37.050 hum of the word radioactive. Dad's word for what 01:02:37.050 --> 01:02:42.130 made his Geiger counter active and a mushroom 01:02:42.130 --> 01:02:48.849 cloud thunder. Loud clouds threaten. Make me 01:02:48.849 --> 01:02:56.429 wonder. Now, it's so interesting. I mean, I wrote 01:02:56.429 --> 01:02:59.710 this book, and it's the first time I realized 01:02:59.710 --> 01:03:04.829 that almost at the end of the book, I'm back 01:03:04.829 --> 01:03:10.989 to thunder and noise and threat and fear. I didn't 01:03:10.989 --> 01:03:13.909 realize that at all. This is, you know, one of 01:03:13.909 --> 01:03:18.449 the very last poems in the book. And that's what 01:03:18.449 --> 01:03:22.670 happens, too, when you let yourself be creative 01:03:22.670 --> 01:03:28.329 and let yourself let whatever... you're doing. 01:03:28.730 --> 01:03:33.150 Let it happen. I see so much, especially when 01:03:33.150 --> 01:03:36.969 I taught writing and that one of the greatest 01:03:36.969 --> 01:03:43.869 enemies to creativity is self -censure. Oh, I 01:03:43.869 --> 01:03:46.869 can't say that. I better. So you change it. You 01:03:46.869 --> 01:03:50.769 don't let, you should let everything come out 01:03:50.769 --> 01:03:54.070 because you can always edit it. You can always 01:03:54.070 --> 01:03:59.829 rewrite it. But you need the whole experience 01:03:59.829 --> 01:04:03.730 of what it was really like. And sometimes it 01:04:03.730 --> 01:04:10.469 feels like vomit on the page. But somewhere in 01:04:10.469 --> 01:04:15.849 there is the clay that will make the statue or 01:04:15.849 --> 01:04:20.170 the paint that will paint the picture or the 01:04:20.170 --> 01:04:26.409 words that will make the poems. And there is 01:04:26.409 --> 01:04:30.630 a lot of stuff that when we write and let ourselves 01:04:30.630 --> 01:04:34.789 write, that's unconscious. It was simply unconscious 01:04:34.789 --> 01:04:37.590 for me. What I just told you about that book, 01:04:37.710 --> 01:04:41.809 that echoes the very first part of the book. 01:04:42.449 --> 01:04:46.789 And of course, what you want is then a reviewer, 01:04:46.809 --> 01:04:50.769 a critic, a great one, especially. I've never 01:04:50.769 --> 01:04:55.170 had one. Same. See how smart he was. He integrated 01:04:55.170 --> 01:04:58.369 that whole book and he made this back thing. 01:04:58.489 --> 01:05:02.849 And I never did it at all. It was writing. It 01:05:02.849 --> 01:05:07.289 was the letting myself write what was coming 01:05:07.289 --> 01:05:11.969 in that particular experience. I've told you 01:05:11.969 --> 01:05:14.349 this before, but they strike this universal chord 01:05:14.349 --> 01:05:19.489 of, yeah, like I'm, yeah, I didn't have the exact. 01:05:20.039 --> 01:05:23.360 same experience as you, you know, with my, with 01:05:23.360 --> 01:05:26.659 a loved one being away in Japan and fighting 01:05:26.659 --> 01:05:30.519 a war, but gosh, dang, like I do stuff all the 01:05:30.519 --> 01:05:32.920 time, just trying to feel closer to those I've 01:05:32.920 --> 01:05:37.420 lost. Yes. I'm a child again, you know, wanting 01:05:37.420 --> 01:05:41.599 that nurturing so desperately. Um, and then in 01:05:41.599 --> 01:05:46.860 working through it, I'm, you do touch, you do 01:05:46.860 --> 01:05:50.130 touch the memory. of something that may comfort 01:05:50.130 --> 01:05:52.969 you a little bit, even if it comes with a sting. 01:05:53.190 --> 01:06:00.789 I don't know. Poetry can do that. As you said, 01:06:00.989 --> 01:06:06.829 the last three poems especially do that. At the 01:06:06.829 --> 01:06:13.469 time I was finishing this book, I was also nearing 01:06:13.469 --> 01:06:17.679 Christmas. It may have been about a... month 01:06:17.679 --> 01:06:22.940 away or I can't quite remember when when I actually 01:06:22.940 --> 01:06:27.539 did the last poem or whatever but I also every 01:06:27.539 --> 01:06:32.619 year I have a Christmas poem that I sent out 01:06:32.619 --> 01:06:36.639 to all my friends you know and as a part of my 01:06:36.639 --> 01:06:43.480 Christmas letter And usually it's about St. Francis 01:06:43.480 --> 01:06:49.460 and Christmas. I've done so many Christmas poems. 01:06:49.739 --> 01:07:01.340 And this year, everything was so heavy that I 01:07:01.340 --> 01:07:09.909 said, it almost was a... harbinger of getting 01:07:09.909 --> 01:07:14.489 COVID. Everything just seemed very heavy. I couldn't 01:07:14.489 --> 01:07:20.530 lift myself out of this. And I certainly couldn't 01:07:20.530 --> 01:07:24.869 write a pious poem or a holy poem. The whole 01:07:24.869 --> 01:07:30.869 world seemed to be going, you know, south. And 01:07:30.869 --> 01:07:37.489 it just was awful. When I came to write my Christmas 01:07:37.489 --> 01:07:45.170 poem, I had written about maybe a month before 01:07:45.170 --> 01:07:50.789 I had written a poem that I said, I'm going to 01:07:50.789 --> 01:07:54.070 use that for my Christmas poem because it has 01:07:54.070 --> 01:07:57.730 nothing to do with what's happening and it has 01:07:57.730 --> 01:08:01.909 everything to do with what is happening. The 01:08:01.909 --> 01:08:05.880 first successful... piece of writing i did was 01:08:05.880 --> 01:08:09.960 in my sophomore year in college and it was like 01:08:09.960 --> 01:08:14.900 it was about me as a boy going out and looking 01:08:14.900 --> 01:08:18.000 at the stars at night i did that every night 01:08:18.000 --> 01:08:22.479 where our little house in on the north side of 01:08:22.479 --> 01:08:25.579 gallup there was a a little sand hill up there 01:08:25.579 --> 01:08:31.220 with a stone i just stared at the stars every 01:08:31.220 --> 01:08:35.800 night And I said, I want something that lifts 01:08:35.800 --> 01:08:41.180 us above this. And so that's the poem that I 01:08:41.180 --> 01:08:47.560 then made the final poem of the book. This is 01:08:47.560 --> 01:08:49.699 one of my favorite poems, too, Father Murray. 01:08:50.279 --> 01:08:54.079 Yeah, so how about you send us off by concluding 01:08:54.079 --> 01:08:56.640 with the final poem in the book, like you said, 01:08:56.800 --> 01:09:01.399 When We Were Meteors. When We Were Meteors. And 01:09:01.399 --> 01:09:07.239 this is a poem that is rhymed for a different 01:09:07.239 --> 01:09:13.260 reason than playing with the eclipse. This is 01:09:13.260 --> 01:09:18.560 a poem that rhymes to make it sing, to make it 01:09:18.560 --> 01:09:26.199 be like a Christmas song, a Christmas, you know, 01:09:26.260 --> 01:09:29.720 like Edgar Allan Poe, which were all dark. Not 01:09:29.720 --> 01:09:33.340 all. But he had some very tearful ones as well. 01:09:33.579 --> 01:09:41.260 But the rhyme here is trying to make a joyful 01:09:41.260 --> 01:09:47.140 sound because it was Christmas. But here it's 01:09:47.140 --> 01:09:49.819 the end of the book and the beginning of the 01:09:49.819 --> 01:09:59.060 book in one way. When we were meteors. Let us 01:09:59.060 --> 01:10:05.000 be young and alive, we find how to fly and thrive. 01:10:05.520 --> 01:10:10.739 Let us lie down in the sand, our entwined fingers 01:10:10.739 --> 01:10:16.340 one hand. Let us look up at the stars, their 01:10:16.340 --> 01:10:22.279 cars of fire as they fall, and call to us where 01:10:22.279 --> 01:10:28.000 we crawl over the high desert's wall. Let us 01:10:28.000 --> 01:10:34.380 fall fast as meteors veer, burn out in our atmosphere. 01:10:35.039 --> 01:10:41.140 Let us, like them, become a rock that once spiraled 01:10:41.140 --> 01:10:46.779 through the dark. Let us watch the night sky's 01:10:46.779 --> 01:10:51.159 sparks that flickered like dying star parts. 01:10:51.500 --> 01:10:57.020 Let us be the dreams we dreamed. Hands joined 01:10:57.020 --> 01:11:02.779 fast as we careened heavenward through dark night. 01:11:03.100 --> 01:11:15.020 Our brave hearts, our hearts delight. Once again, 01:11:15.060 --> 01:11:18.359 that was Father Murray Bodo. You can order his 01:11:18.359 --> 01:11:21.380 new book, Brother Wind and Air, A Lifetime in 01:11:21.380 --> 01:11:24.600 Verse, in Ascension Press' online store, which 01:11:24.600 --> 01:11:26.979 I've linked to in the show notes of this episode. 01:11:27.739 --> 01:11:30.300 Simply visit the description of the episode on 01:11:30.300 --> 01:11:32.399 whichever platform you're listening to this podcast, 01:11:32.739 --> 01:11:36.199 or you can visit franciscanmedia .org for more 01:11:36.199 --> 01:11:39.380 detailed show notes of my interview with Father 01:11:39.380 --> 01:11:42.539 Murray Bodo. You can also visit ascensionpress 01:11:42.539 --> 01:11:46.079 .com slash products. There's a little search 01:11:46.079 --> 01:11:49.029 tool. on the right -hand side of the browser. 01:11:49.270 --> 01:11:52.189 Just type in Murray Bodo or Brother Wind and 01:11:52.189 --> 01:11:54.689 Air, and his book will pop right up. Again, that's 01:11:54.689 --> 01:11:58.329 ascensionpress .com slash products, and then 01:11:58.329 --> 01:12:01.430 type in Brother Wind and Air or Murray Bodo in 01:12:01.430 --> 01:12:04.210 the search tool in the right -hand corner. I 01:12:04.210 --> 01:12:06.050 have linked to more of Father Murray's work in 01:12:06.050 --> 01:12:08.050 the show notes of this episode, as well as other 01:12:08.050 --> 01:12:11.329 celebratory resources for this jubilee year of 01:12:11.329 --> 01:12:14.550 St. Francis of Assisi. Thanks for tuning in, 01:12:14.609 --> 01:12:17.770 and thanks as always for your support. This is 01:12:17.770 --> 01:12:21.369 Stephen Copeland signing off. Peace and all good.