Namenloser

Namenloser

Mitternacht und Mondesrund und Morgenrot
sind geborgen in der unsichtbaren Hand
Jenes, der die Liebe lebt, uns anverwandt,
Jenes, der das Leben liebt – und unsern Tod,
eh’ wir jeder noch geboren, schon gebannt.
Morgendunst und Mittagsglut und Abendrand.

Wir kennen nicht die Hand, die uns im Mutterleib
gestaltet und begabt hat, kennen nicht den Geist,
der uns gesegnet und gesendet und gespeist.
Wie oft wohl ruft er: Bist du da? Bist du bereit?
Beim Namen ruft er uns, der Namenloser heißt,
um den das Heer der Himmel unablässig kreist.

Christina Egan ©2023  

Spiral galaxy, dense around luminous core.

The Nameless One is a philosophical poem about the Heavens behind the heavens and the power behind it all. The legions of the skies could therfore be the stars or the angels.

Some of the pulsating and orbiting of the universe might be captured in these lines and rhymes… which is why it is best to read poetry in the original language and to read it out loud or listen to it!

By contrast, Presence needs to be seen on paper or on a screen to unfold its effect: the image of drops is visualised in the shape of the stanzas. This, too, works best in the original language.

Photograph: The spiral galaxy NGC 4414. The Hubble Heritage Team (AURA/STScI/NASA)NASA Headquarters – Greatest Images of NASA (NASA-HQ-GRIN), Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

Presence (Peace)

Photograph: The spiral galaxy NGC 4414. The Hubble Heritage Team (AURA/STScI/NASA)NASA Headquarters – Greatest Images of NASA (NASA-HQ-GRIN), Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

The Lake and the Rain

The Lake and the Rain

The lake is a mirror
of willow and reed,
a sheet of opaque
and buckled glass
whose bulges break
the billowing leaves
and swaying stalks,
so that the strokes
of umbra and ochre,
of olive and lime
form ever new patterns…

And then the drizzle
adds ripple on ripple,
painting an intricate
pulsing design
of circles and squares,
flashing and fleeting,
never repeating…
never depleted…
never completed…
It all has a meaning,
It all, maybe, matters.

Christina Egan ©2022

Summer Rain (II)

The summer clouds, the summer sun
are dazzling on the little lake,
the summer wind, the summer rain
are writing on its shiny slate.

You need not know the ancient script,
you need not know the ancient tongue:
the message echoes in your chest,
the summer rain, the summer sun.

Christina Egan ©2023

The first poem resembles a Cubist painting of overlapping and breaking shapes in sombre earthy colours: nature viewed as an abstract painting, or rather, a composition in permanent motion.

The second poem reads the rain on the lake as a secret message, perhaps like the ancient declarations on the Rosetta Stone… We may not be able to decipher or understand the message sufficiently, but it is there!

Everything reflects everything else… and perhaps the whole world reflects a higher world. All this beauty and meaning can be found in the smallest slice of nature, in the pond down the road.