First Silence

A Poem from Taizé

In July I was able to make a visit I had long been wanting to make, a week of retreat with the Taizé Community in Taizé, France.

During the thrice a day prayers with the brothers of Taizé, you are invited into ten minutes of silence. I don't typically practice silence as a prayer regimen, so it took me a while to rest into it over the week. The first day, though, was a challenge. It's amazing how noisy your mind is when you stop to notice. It takes some practice to get the mind to quiet down. It took me a solid day.

Anyway, I wrote this poem after my first day at Taizé trying to capture that experience of struggling with the silence:

into the silence:

chattering noise
chasing the rattle
of skeleton thoughts
stones shaking in a rusty can

sitting as audience and actor
a drama a pious pretense
observing my holy playacting

little else
the confession
little else
than this anxious mental spiral

yet in the seams
of a restless mind
a steady Love
glimpsed and eclipsed
glimpsed and eclipsed
a field of sunflowers passing through
paneled rushing windows
along a grey motorway