The Poetry of Jessica Powers

Yesterday's entry in Give Us This Day included a poem by Jessica Powers, whose poetry has touched me before and now once again:

I am copying down in a book from my heart's archives

the day that I ceased to fear God with a shadowy fear.

Would you name it the day that I measured my column of virtue

and sighted through windows of merit a crown that was near?

Ah, no, it was rather the day I began to see truly

that I came forth from nothing and ever toward nothingness tend,

that the works of my hands are a foolishness wrought in the presence

of the worthiest king in a kingdom that never shall end.

I rose up from the acres of self that I tended with passion

and defended with flurries of pride;

I walked out of myself and went into the woods of God's mercy,

and here I abide.

There is greeness and calmness and coolness, a soft leafy covering

from the judgment of sun overhead,

and the hush of His peace, and the moss of His mercy to tread.

I have naught but my will seeking God; even love burning in me

is a fragment of infinite loving and never my own.

And I fear God no more; I go forward to wander forever

in a wilderness made of His infinite mercy alone.

 

I read and re-read this poem and know its truth.  There is nothing I can add that would not take away from her words.