selections from Uttering Her Name, by Gabriel Rosenstock

Dar Óma

what speeded them on their way?
what distances did they travel?
the sky was full of falling stars ...
You draw down too much light -
soon the heavens will all be bare

2

Dar Óma
yesterday
I went looking
for You
and found You
everywhere
particularly
in the flight of swallows
innumerable
in the darkening air

it seemed they wished
to fan the dying sun
to flame

3

Dar Óma

look at this full fruit

falling for You every time

unconsciously

this tree

its limbs Yours

oozing sap

its roots

its perfume Yours

lichen clings to bark

hold me

deep deep down You are always there

awaiting my blossoming in You

kirtana of singing leaves

4

Dar Óma
holding Your image before me
on a screen
increasing percentages
until You disintegrate
like some forgotten galaxy
calling You back again
a retrieval
a respite from senseless oblivion

I know that stars are born
only to die
we see the light
of heavenly bodies
long since gone

this also I know:
Your light shines in me
the universe holds no terror

25

Dar Óma

snake unwinding

from a lightning-blasted tree

I’ve spotted You

why should I flee?

I am already deep in Your eyes

come

take all of me

mercifully

let me assist You

here’s my head firmly in Your jaws

do not use Your fangs

to stun me

let me live

this death in You now

inch by slow inch

35

Dar Óma

I can never forget the yellowhammers

I saw as a child

tiny chicks nesting in a stone wall

such clamour from their throats

such hunger

nearby was a dark Protestant church

it was taboo to enter

God manifested that day in yellow

the colour I see You in now

dust of buttercups

primrose glance

You are the yellowhammer

ensconced in a mossy stone wall

we see each other

from different worlds

for the first time

41

Dar Óma

I went to my excellent physician

author of Addiction Replacement Therapy

he put me on heroin

and monitored my progress steadily

greater than your craving for the drug?>

I nodded, sagely

he put me on LSD

orbiting one another

their beams are peacock feathers

showering on crab-apple trees

in the Isle of the Blest

their taste is dry>

the doctor is perplexed

the universe perplexed

---

These have been selections from Uttering Her Name, by Gabriel Rosenstock. There are over a hundred more poems in the book.

Uttering Her Name consists of spontaneous, ecstatic utterances in what the author calls a neo-bhakti style, that is to say a modern slant on those poems of intense devotion which are still read and sung in India today.

Gabriel is considered the greatest living Irish lyric poet.

For more information about Uttering Her Name, please visit

http://www.salmonpoetry.com/details.php?ID=175&a=163

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"In Gertrude's heart you will find Me"

Saint Gertrude is portrayed here iwth the Sacred Heart of Jesus resting within her own chest, and the inscription around it reads "In Gertrude's heart you will find Me."

Saint Gertrude:

"My lover, my lover, give me your blessing; flow out and let me in. From my heart, from my heart, I long for you, and I beg you, beloved of my heart, that I may be your own. Ah! That in your living love I may sprout out like a new spirituality like the lilies taht enjoy the water and the valley."

from II:12-17 in her Spiritual Exercises

Love & devotion

“I was reading in the library from a book about Sri Ramakrishna, and I stumbled upon a story about a seeker who once came to see the great master and admitted to him that she feared she was not a good enough devotee, feared that she did not love God enough. And the saint said, ‘Is there nothing you love?’ The woman admitted that she adored her young nephew more than anything on earth. The saint said, ‘There, then. He is your Krishna, your beloved. In your service to your nephew, you are serving God.’ ”

Eat, Pray, and Love, by Elizabeth Gilbert, pp. 169, 170

“Whatever I have tried to do in life, I have tried with all my heart to do it well; whatever I have devoted myself to, I have devoted myself completely; in great aims and in small I have always thoroughly been in earnest.”

—Charles Dickens (1812-70), novelist

Let the whole of mankind tremble
the whole world shake
and the heavens exult
when Christ, the Son of the living God,
is on the altar
in the hands of a priest.
O admirable heights and sublime lowliness!
O sublime humility!
O humble sublimity!
That the Lord of the universe,
God and the Son of God,
so humbles Himself
that for our salvation
He hides Himself under the little form of bread!
Look, brothers, at the humility of God
and pour out your hearts before Him!
Humble yourselves, as well,
that you may be exalted by Him.
Therefore,
hold back nothing of yourselves for yourselves
so that
He Who gives Himself totally to you
may receive you totally.
-St Francis of Assisi (1181-1226)

buy the book:

09.04.08 - Love

“Nothing is effective and certain, but the heart of love. Nothing is safe and certain, but the life of devotion. Nothing is fulfilling and certain, but the soul of surrender.”

- Sri Chinmoy

Excerpt from Arise! Awake! Thoughts Of A Yogi by Sri Chinmoy.