The white wind
an original poem.
The white wind washes out, O Lord,
whips out and over me (it's cold,
and sure its chill does wash out all
the chill inside of me). O Lord, call
me Your own; O call me back, me
who the whipping wind washed out! See
me back (it is so cold, and yet
cold may make good as I can get),
me borne, O Lord, by the white wind.
I scribbled this poem out one December afternoon, still cold, after having walked to class through the beginnings of a storm. Snow had not yet begun to fall, but the brisk promise of it was breathed in the wind. I had bent my head and hugged one arm across myself, the other extended so that the coffee which was bound to splash out of my mug wouldn’t ruin my coat, and this poem was breathed into me in the same way winter was breathed into the wind.
This is as much a poem as a prayer; the wind felt figurative of so much that was happening in my spiritual life at the moment. In the classroom, as so often happens with prayer or poetry, I couldn’t focus until I wrote it out. I did, and covered the page with scribbles as I tweaked the meter and assonance until it felt exactly as I had when I trudged across the lawn. Then Aristotle could be attended to, because the wind had been.




This is so beautiful!!! Great job, I wish I could write like you!!