Heap it up, press it down, watch it flow over. (30.vii.87)

You can tell what a man is worth
by the way he treats people who can do nothing for him.
But I also like the older, slightly different, idea
that a man's worth is measured by the quality of his hospitality,
by his readiness to share his salt.

A thousand years ago, we had a name for the profession
of living at a crossroads and feeding all and sundry
from a big, steaming stew-pot. It ranked
somewhere near a bishop. We still have bishops.
God be with the days!

You might be a long time walking the roads, nowadays,
before you met the like, but, thank Christ,
there are a few houses left, and I know where they are,
where you wouldn't be left standing
with one arm as long as the other.

I haven't the slightest objection in the world
to singing for my supper. Would you like a song?
I'll sing you one. I'll sing you ten.
I'll sing until you beg me to stop,
or the sun comes up again.

Would you rather hear a story, or just talk
of old or new things, light or deep things,
sad, or brave, or gay, or silly things?
Give me half a hint, or the glint of an eye,
and I'll pull up a chair and we'll start.

Before the Council (29.vii.87)

Any day of the week, at half-past ten,
you could stand outside any church in town
and watch the faithful trickling out,
with the calm and inward look of those
who knew in their hearts, without any doubt,
that they had, once again, added to their store
yet another infinity of merit.

The arithmetic of infinity
was not like the other,
that we learned at school,
but it had a logic all its own,
and was easy to work with,
once you knew the rules.

The small print, however, could catch you out.
Did you know that, without the proper disposition
-- a complete aversion from all sin --
a Hail Mary might only get you
nine or ten thousand years years off purgatory,
instead of a full remission?

Do you know what complete aversion means?
Complete aversion is pretty rare.
In all of history, there were only two cases,
and there is no prize for guessing who they were.

Between this, and other little snags I won't mention,
you might have done better, on the whole,
hoping for time off for good behavious,
or a chance of making heaven on parole.

Grave Matter and No Consent (27.vii.87)

Little things have a way of becoming serious.
I know a house, full of children, with no bicycles.
It's not completely full. One of the children is buried
not too far from one of mine.

We still have bicyles. We simply gave away his.
Our madness took another form. We're short a gate.
We cut it off, and threw it away,
and trained a climbing rose across the gap.

We planted him a beech tree, too, that grows
smooth and cold, and beautiful, like him,
but will, perhaps, grow tall and strong,
as he did not.

Then we cried and made another baby, not the same,
another baby, and he too grows smooth and beautiful,
with legs like pillars, but warm,
a solid, happy, fragile joy.

What do I think? I think that we have all
to die, sooner or later, and can't choose when.
We have no right. That's how it is.
Our lives are cut and rounded for us.

But, God, I think about him every day,
and wish he hadn't died.
A man should die after his father, and before his sons,
however rarely it works out that way.

Lord, I don't agree with your way of doing things.
I don't agree, and I won't agree.
We are just going to have to agree
to differ on this one.

Hard Words (29.vii.87)

The bereaved are treated gently,
perhaps too gently.

Every day, when I went to grieve,
I saw the grave-digger, cutting weeds,
and keeping the place tidy,
but we never spoke, beyond a nod.

Then, one day, he came and said:
"This place is full of dead children,
and nobody weeps for them,
but their own."

What do I make of this?
It burned in my mind.
He is right.
The whole world is full of dead children,
and always was.
An ocean of uncontainable sadness,
washing round the feet of all our joys.
All life would end, buried away down deep
beneath the crushing load of sorrow,
were we not immune to most of that distress.
Our own is almost too much, as it is.
Many simply sit, pining, paralysed,
and waiting for uniting death.

I am ready to die, for my child is dead.
But though I am wounded, there are things worth doing,
and though I bleed, I still can stand
and force the gates of the resisting world.
Grief is a drug. For a while, it heals,
but in the end it kills.
The illusion of loyalty produces worse betrayal.
Life is to live. Our dead don't need our grief.