Here's your Daily Poem from the Poetry Chaikhana --
 | Draw me after You! By Clare of Assisi
(1193? - 1254) English version by Regis J. Armstrong, OFM CAP & Ignatius C. Brady, OFM Draw me after You!
We will run in the fragrance of Your perfumes,
O heavenly Spouse!
I will run and not tire,
until You bring me into the wine-cellar,
until Your left hand is under my head
and Your right hand will embrace me happily
and You will kiss me with the happiest kiss of Your mouth. 
/ Photo by gogoloopie /
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| ============ Thought for the Day: You needn't be a monk
in daily life,
But be a monk
in meditation. ============ | Here's your Daily Music selection -- 
Richard Souther
Illumination: Hildegard von Bingen: The Fire of the Spirit
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Hi Omss -
A wonderfully intimate, almost erotic poem by Clare of Assisi.
This love poem to God reads like a chapter taken from the Song of Songs. It also shows an influence of the Troubadour songs so loved by St. Francis, with possibly a suggestion of the Sufi poetry that circulated through the Mediterranean, because of the Muslim kingdoms in Spain, North Africa, and the Near East.
The image of a divine "wine-cellar" is an especially interesting metaphor, one that often occurs in Sufi writings. Wine here is a reference to the sense of sweetness on the palette during the ecstasy of deep spiritual states, the sense of "drinking" a subtle substance that spreads a warmth through the heart and belly, and the giddiness and trembling that often accompany the state. This is the marriage wine of mystical union. To refer specifically to a "wine-cellar" also recalls the sense of being carried to another place, a place apart, a hidden place in which one secretly meets the Beloved, a place sometimes called the marriage chamber.
I love the translation of the last line, "...and you will kiss me with the happiest kiss of Your mouth." Such a sweet, intimate image of divine union.
==
The story of St. Clare is closely linked with St. Francis of Assisi. Clare was twelve years younger than Francis and, like him, was raised in Assisi in a wealthy family. Clare was the third of five children. Because of age differences and coming from different ends of town, Clare probably did not know the young, profligate Francis before his conversion. Doubtless, though, she heard of the spectacle of how Francis renounced his family and wealth and his subsequent wanderings through the countryside helping the sick and the poor.
When Clare was 18, she heard Francis give a series of sermons during the Lent season. On Palm Sunday, late at night, Clare snuck out of her family house and, outside the walls of Assisi, met with Francis and his followers. She put on a simple habit and Francis personally cut off her hair as a symbol of her renunciation.
Francis arranged for Clare to stay at a local Benedictine convent, since it would not have seemed proper for her to stay with Francis and his fellow monks. A few days later, Clare's family discovered where she was staying and tried to drag her from the convent. Only when she revealed her cropped hair did they relent and give up claim on her.
Francis often turned to Clare for advice and inspiration. When Francis was torn between a life of prayer and one of preaching, it was Clare who advised him to speak, saying, "God did not call you for yourself alone."
Clare lived twenty-seven years beyond the death of Francis. During most of those remaining years she was apparently ill with a mysterious sickness that kept her bedridden, though she remained a strong-minded and determined woman throughout that period. In spite of ongoing struggles with Church authorities -- or perhaps because of them -- popes, cardinals and bishops often came to consult her.
Clare was declared a saint sixty years after her death.
==
Have a beautiful weekend... passionately embraced by the Beloved!
> Sending much love! <
Ivan
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Ivan M. Granger's original poetry, stories and commentaries are Copyright © 2002 - 2011 by Ivan M. Granger.
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