Foliate with Tongues and Things

It is Week 7 — the final week of the Hidden Cathedral Poetry Celebration. Join us for our finale on May 22 for “Poetry and Prayer”

with 17th century priest-poet George Herbert, and his contemporary counterpart, Malcolm Guite. Click below to learn more and register:

“Seven” is a number signifying completion and God whose Spirit first brooded over the waters and Who later rested on the seventh day after creation. Yesterday we began the week leading up to Pentecost, the festival on which the Spirit came sounding like a rushing wind and appeared as cloven tongues like fire above early followers of Jesus Christ (gathered in Jerusalem for the Jewish Feast of Weeks) who then began to speak, as did those who witnessed this event and thought them drunk…..

Pentecost by Brynna Carpenter-Nardone

Pentecost by Brynna Carpenter-Nardone

This week’s readings also speak of heavenliness and earthliness in sometimes jarring juxtposition…..

Marly reads Jane Swart who takes Saint Martha through the ages and back again to her unique relation to Jesus in a last line.

Marly ruminates on reconciliation with outer and inner landscapes in this reading of a poem by Lisa McCabe

Marly reads a poem, “I Heard Their Wings Like the Sound of Many Waters” from her own book Foliate Head. As it was for those at Pentecost, here the writer hears an “unlikeness” as well as things she likens.

A final, light-ish poem by A.M. Juster to Mr. Wizard that comes in on a wind straight from the 1970’s and ends, well….

A foliate head (or “green man”) carved in the choir stalls of our cathedral.

A foliate head (or “green man”) carved in the choir stalls of our cathedral.

Click on the videos to watch them on YouTube’s website where you can scroll down to read Marly’s notes about the poets and find links to more of their work. Stay tuned for a post this week from poet Evan Craig Reardon, and await Pentecost on May 23 when we will unleash the hidden page of the Hidden Cathedral Poetry Celebration and make it available on our website.