Corfu, by George McHenry of Transit Notes
Is there anything that can take from you the hope of being someday in the God you are helping to create in each attentive act of love?
Please celebrate this Christmas with the earnest faith that He may need this very anguish of yours in order to begin. These very days that are such a trial for you may well be the time when everything in you is working at Him, as once you so urgently did as a child. Be patient and without resentment, and know that the least we can do is to make His Becoming no more difficult than Earth makes it for spring when it wants to arrive. Be comforted and glad.
Rome, December 23, 1903
Letters to a Young Poet
It's an honor once again to have a painting of mine displayed adjacent to the magnificent words of Rilke. Everything he writes is like a prayer—or perhaps the answer to a prayer. I will miss this blog at the end of the year, for Rilke has made the sun a little brighter for this entire year. Thanks so much for your tireless devotion, Ruth and Lorenzo. You and Rilke have created a beautiful conspiracy to lift the human heart and remind us daily of life's infinite possibilities.
ReplyDeleteI love this reading today, too, George. The idea of creating God is so honest and wonderful. I wonder what he wrote in the German for the "working at Him" to be translated that way, so perfect. Then the thought that in difficult times we can at the very least not make it more difficult for things to come to fruition, is remarkable. To think of spring as earth's permission for its unfolding, just turns the thought of "struggle" on its head.
ReplyDeleteThe painting "Corfu" is so gorgeous. My eyes are drawn to that lit horizon, and I can't tell for sure, but I'm almost positive that hope is rising, ever rising, not setting. The painting itself lets it rise easily, effortlessly, like spring. Thank you again for sharing your art with us freely, George.
I am comforted and glad. A really tremendous work, George — those sparky blues on the horizon, whatever they signify, are electric.
ReplyDeleteI feel as if these words were written to me, as I come to the difficult, painful end of this year. I can only say yes to the spring I know will come.
ReplyDeleteThe daily offerings here often have filled me in ways other words elsewhere have not. Thank you, Lorenzo and Ruth.
George, it's a delight to see the image of your painting here, once again a beautiful pairing of two artistic sensibilities.
To be both comforted and glad is to understand the meaning of hope.
to me it seems rilke unnames god and in the unnaming, he makes all god. this makes perfect sense to me.
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no! this will not end, will it? jesusgod, i never really thought it through. these things can not end, can they? this celebration, this investigation. it seems like even here we are working at Him or It.
do you know, this time here has made me into something new? did you know that? did you realize? what power resonates on this undulating page!
thanks is so small up against what i owe you, ruth, and lorenzo, and rilke, too.)
xo
erin
Beautiful-- A blessed Noel to all.. xxxj
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