Keep it simple, stupid!
I have had a useful and a challenging conversation about my blog. The creative criticism comes from someone deeply experienced in education, who feels that my style is too opaque and needs to have a much greater immediacy and simplicity to it.... So if that is the case, I shall try to improve! It also raises the question as to what this blog's purpose might be. Well, that's important in that I fel summoned to define more clearly. But then, I wonder whether the attempt at clarity of purpose can become an object in itself... Oh well! get on with it Martin!
Following Columba means inevitably that I will be 'following', from time to time, with someone else. Two of us may be walking together. In fact, a quick look at the Gospels reveals that that is precisely what Jesus did frequently. Walking along a road or a path beside another becomes accompaniment rather than direction-giving. What I adore doing is walking with someone I love/admire/respect (etc!) and saying gently to each other what we notice on the walk, no matter how simple..... simply being in this very moment, without analysis or interpretation. Then comes the moment when together the imagination can 'stretch' the experience of the ordinary in such a way that the ordinariness is not lost, but becomes an opportunty for improvisation.... After the walk is over, over a cup of tea, (or something!) sharing the experience in an act of remembrance. 'Do this in Remembrance of Me'.
And a poem which I have written recently that will not necessarily be simple and direct, but I hope captures some feelings I have in the following.
Argyll Theophany.
Martin Shaw October 2006.
Though winter's winds and darkness' jaws
Close on our horizons;
Though the tossed histories of Argyll's dissensions' heat
Mark the psyche, acknowledgedor denied;
Though Jacobite echoes diminish
And fresh attempts at revival
Die from rootlessness;
Though the seas signal a plea for simplicity
From gratifications addiction;
Though those with a memory for words
Crafted long for God
Are now old or unreplaced;
Though the fear of death chokes
Gentle Patience's gift
And the primordial rock of order crumbles,
Yet the water flashes glory still,
And the catchers wait on the sand.
The tilled lady smiles heaven
And the poor joke's an Alleluia.
The wince at my bare foot's pain
Points me to a shell's lustre.
These are transfigurations nearly slipped.
The child's eye is wide in me still.
I will remember.
In the love of God,
+Martin
Argyll and The Isles
Following Columba means inevitably that I will be 'following', from time to time, with someone else. Two of us may be walking together. In fact, a quick look at the Gospels reveals that that is precisely what Jesus did frequently. Walking along a road or a path beside another becomes accompaniment rather than direction-giving. What I adore doing is walking with someone I love/admire/respect (etc!) and saying gently to each other what we notice on the walk, no matter how simple..... simply being in this very moment, without analysis or interpretation. Then comes the moment when together the imagination can 'stretch' the experience of the ordinary in such a way that the ordinariness is not lost, but becomes an opportunty for improvisation.... After the walk is over, over a cup of tea, (or something!) sharing the experience in an act of remembrance. 'Do this in Remembrance of Me'.
And a poem which I have written recently that will not necessarily be simple and direct, but I hope captures some feelings I have in the following.
Argyll Theophany.
Martin Shaw October 2006.
Though winter's winds and darkness' jaws
Close on our horizons;
Though the tossed histories of Argyll's dissensions' heat
Mark the psyche, acknowledgedor denied;
Though Jacobite echoes diminish
And fresh attempts at revival
Die from rootlessness;
Though the seas signal a plea for simplicity
From gratifications addiction;
Though those with a memory for words
Crafted long for God
Are now old or unreplaced;
Though the fear of death chokes
Gentle Patience's gift
And the primordial rock of order crumbles,
Yet the water flashes glory still,
And the catchers wait on the sand.
The tilled lady smiles heaven
And the poor joke's an Alleluia.
The wince at my bare foot's pain
Points me to a shell's lustre.
These are transfigurations nearly slipped.
The child's eye is wide in me still.
I will remember.
In the love of God,
+Martin
Argyll and The Isles
posted by Martin at 3:07 pm
4 Comments:
'A manifestation of Deity in sensible form'
You don't have to keep it all that simple - it's fun finding out.
The simplicity of nature is in it's unnoticed complexity.
I agree with Jimmy. I check your blog every day and feel 'deprived' when it doesnt appear.Your reflections are a delightful and refreshing contrast to the hidden 'shallows'of the public discourse of the SEC we know and sometimes love.
It's not simple, is it? I often think the only way to express the heart of the matter is in poetry. Or music. Normal prose can be at once too prescriptive and too blunt an instrument.
One of may favourite quotes from Kant: "we require no skill to make ourselves intelligible to the multitude once we renounce all profundity of thought."
Thanks for the poem. In that short piece I learned so much about the interaction between your land- and seascape with the history and the daily struggles of where you are.
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