March 25, 2009

Message Received



She knelt beside the neatly planted rows
of cummin, dill, and mint. The clear March sky
was bright; a flock of birds flew high.
She pinched a leaf;
                    then, suddenly, she froze —
a voice had spoken. There was no one there.
It spoke a second time; she looked around.
“How can this be?” she asked the vacant air.
Once more it spoke, yet there was not a sound.
She paused again; her answer in her mind.

In thirty years and three, her words would find
an echo: “Not my will, but thine be done,”
said in another garden by her son,
while three friends slept.
                           So here none heard her words —
except an angel, a high flight of birds,
and three neat rows of cummin, mint, and dill:
“Be it to me according to thy will.”

April 7, 1989
Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG


written just under twenty years ago; first appearing in print on the cover of The Living Church in 1993, and on this blog in 2006. The icon dates from 1999.

9 comments:

James said...

Tobias - thank you for this; it touched me a great deal. In 51 years, I have never "connected" Mary's "your will" and Jesus "your will". Thank you.

Allison Elaine said...

She is beautiful. And your poem beautifully closes the circle of which the center is God's love.

Göran Koch-Swahne said...

So beautiful. Thank you!

Fran said...

Oh Tobias - I am left speechless in the best of all possible ways.

Thank you.

Anonymous said...

Beautiful! Thank you so much for posting today.

barbarab said...

Thank you for this: a true blessing!

Frair John said...

Beautiful!

Thank you for posting these today.

susan s. said...

Thanks for this. I just came here for a last check before retiring. What a lovely icon.

TheraP said...

I've had this open as a tab. It is so lovely. Wish I could write a short poem - suitable for such lovely verse. So apt.

Amen.