The Poetry of Friendship
LETTER BY BRIAN MORYKON
Confession: I don’t enjoy most poetry.
Even when I know it’s good — because people have told me so or it bears the marks of craftsmanship — I often still have to choke down the strange syntax and dense wording. I suppose even fine wine tastes like medicine to unrefined tastes.
Still, every once in a while, a poem stops me in my tracks, unlocks a rusted-shut door in my heart, and hands me a set of glasses with a sharper prescription.
At its best, art — a poem, story, film, painting — strips away abstraction and puts you closer to the Real. Paradoxically, it often does this through paradox and metaphor. To paraphrase Tolkien, good art isn’t an escape from reality; it’s an escape into it.
Years ago, I attended a concert for the rock band U2. The first sight of the stage took my breath away — not because of who would be on it, but because of the sheer size of it. Nicknamed “the Claw,” it looked like an import from an alien civilization. Bono joked in his Irish accent, “How do you like our space junk?”
One fan later asked the band, Do you really need all this stuff? They said no. The elaborate experience was designed to “disorientate people so they’re more open to being touched.”
If the people at the concert were touched, you wouldn’t have known it. During dance-worthy tunes, our sleepy section of the stadium stayed seated. My wife and I stood and sang along anyway, something we may not have done had we attended alone. That’s what friends can do — help each other wake up to the wonder in front of you.
This week’s podcast conversation is about a friendship between Luci Shaw — a poet whose creative output continues in her tenth decade of life — and the late Madeleine L’Engle, famed author of A Wrinkle in Time.
L’Engle came from a liberal Christian tradition, Shaw from a conservative one. They stretched and challenged and spurred each other on to love and good art. Their “working together was truly an act of worship to God.”
Good friendship — like good art — opens, accompanies, and challenges us. It calls our bluff and calls us up to who we’re made to be and what we’re made to do. You see that with Luci and Madeleine, and we’ll explore spiritual friendship more in the weeks to come. In the meantime…
Lord, as your prophets often tried to do for their listeners, disorient us through story and poetry. And in our disorientation, may we allow our hearts to be touched and changed. For anyone reading this who is lonely, please connect them to a deep friend or two. And for those of us who have withdrawn from friendship for fear of rejection and wounding, give us courage to engage again — so we can know the truth and joy that “a threefold cord is not quickly broken.” Amen.
Brian Morykon
Director of Communications
Applications for Renovaré’s new full-time position, Director of Church Engagement, are open until March 1.
Sign up for Renovaré Weekly
Thoughtfully introduced Christ-centered spiritual formation resources.
Thanks for subscribing! We'll send you a confirmation email.
LET’S DIVE IN...
CURATED BY GRACE POUCH
-
1.
Listen to the newest episode of Life with God in which Nate Foster talks with Luci Shaw about her friend and literary colleague, Madeleine L’Engle.
-
2.
Luci Shaw claims that a poet’s cultivated gift of perception helps illuminate invisible realities in her essay “Prophets and Poets” .
-
3.
Three poems by Madeleine L’Engle beckon us into Silence, Temperance, and Awe.
-
4.
In “How To Be a Poet,” Wendell Berry writes “like prayers/ prayed back to the one who prays,/ make a poem that does not disturb/ the silence from which it came.”
-
5.
Seven poems for Lent compiled by the Englewood Review display poetry’s uncanny ability to pull us into the depths of devotion with a few, carefully chosen words.
-
6.
Brian here: I asked Grace to include the poem from John O’Donohue, “For One Who Is Exhausted, a Blessing” because 1) it’s one of the poems that stopped me in my tracks, and 2) it was given to me by a friend at just the right moment.
-
7.
Bonus: Renovaré’s president, Ted Harro, has a love for artfully written prayers and writes his own liturgies from time to time. He wrote “A Liturgy for Engaging Faithfully in a Contentious Political Season” to help turn our hearts toward Jesus and remind us of God’s love for friends, enemies, and challenging neighbors. Download and share it as you feel led.
Grace Pouch
Content Manager