More on: holiness

MY ATTENTION WANDERED from the closely printed pages of my first Bible, inscribed for darling Thomas from Gran April 1943, to its all too few illustrations. This was wartime England, with rationing. The picture pages showed brightly lit scenes of temple worship furnished, as it were, from Harrods. Jesus was turned out in clothes better…

Upon Listening to Biber’s Rosary Sonatas Scordatura: Abnormal tuning of a stringed instrument in order to obtain unusual chords, facilitate difficult passages, or change the tone color. —Harvard Dictionary of Music, second edition ALTHOUGH I AM a piano tuner who used to play a violin, I would not dream of referring to the violin as…

Where the Lord lives in heaven, is he lonely? Does our Father walk his marble floors without the company of anyone righteous? Who alone is venerable enough to keep the Lord company? My voice is small, yet I call to your house, Lord. Does the wind enter your chambers and rooms, cold and empty? Where…

Speak to me about the presence of absence. Not everything created can be seen. As the uncreated may be glimpsed from a slant. What we bring is attention— prayer in our hands, spirit in our lungs. Emptiness—but a focus on what borders and frames the space— what the space is filled by. Nothing empty of…

Our speaker has a tongue screw with him, though it is a replica. He speaks of spectacle, witness, dying well. One group’s criminals…. Stories are not preserved by accident. Heroes are made necessary by the nature of memory. Life is stronger than death, and that is why we must praise. I think. Identity depends on…

In the past, I have asked for what this may be,             more faithfully perhaps, haven’t I, for some covenant of intimate favor             waiting along a byway? So how then should it be seen, what begins as just             a blue, late morning crease between heavy rains, noticing the usual roadside toll             of…