POETRY: Catherine of Siena (Six Poems)

Consumed in Grace

I first saw God when I was a child, six years of age.
The cheeks of the sun were pale before Him,
and the earth acted as a shy
girl, like me.

Divine light entered my heart from His love
that did never fully wane,

though indeed, dear, I can understand how a person’s
faith can at times flicker,

for what is the mind to do
with something that becomes the mind’s ruin:
a God that consumes us
in His grace.

I have seen what you want;
it is there,

a Beloved of infinite
tenderness.

---

Vulnerable

Vulnerable we are, like an infant.
We need each other’s care
or we will
suffer.

---

I Won’t Take No For An Answer

“I won’t take no for an answer,”
God began to say
to me

when He opened His arms each night
wanting us to
dance.

---

They Kiss Sometimes

They kiss sometimes when no one is looking,
the sun and
moon.

Why are they so shy before us—
haven’t we all seen someone making love?

I wept once for three days because He
would not touch
me—

for is it not a bride’s right
to know Him?

I have seen what I want in heaven’s shop.
Crazed I have become for this.

He was sitting in a window one day, my Lord,
when I walked through the sky’s
streets.

---

The Hymns of the Earth

I wanted to be a hermit and only hear the hymns
of the earth, and the laughter of the sky,

and the sweet gossip of the creatures on my limbs,
the forests.

I wanted to be a hermit and not see another face
look upon mine and tell me I was not all the beauty in this world.

For so many faces do that—
cage us.

The wings we have are so fragile
they can break from just
one word, or

a glance void
of love.

I wanted to live in that cloister of
light’s silence

because, is it not true, the heart
is so fragile and shy.

---

Until Your Own Dawn

Daybreak:
everything in this world is a luminous divine dream
I have spun.

I did not know life was a fabric woven by my soul.
Any form that can appear to you—should I confess this?—
it is something I made.
All roots nurse
from
me.

God’s art is mine. I did not want His divine talent.
It simply grew in my heart from
the way I
loved.

Existence is as a young child moving through
a lane at night;

it wanted to
hold my
hand.

Here, dear earth, hold me,
until your own
dawn.