Friday, March 21, 2008

Riding Westward

Okay, I know I should be contemplating weightier things at the moment. Still, my Huskies -- why?!? There goes my bracket, too. Guess I'll just consider this my Good Friday pennance.

UPDATE: In all seriousness, I have had some occasion to reflect today -- and much along the lines of a poem a good friend turned me on to several years ago. It's called "Good Friday, 1613, Riding Westward" by the English poet John Donne:

"...Pleasure or business, so, our souls admit
For their first mover, and are whirl'd by it.
Hence is't, that I am carried towards the west,
This day, when my soul's form bends to the East...

"Yet dare I almost be glad, I do not see
That spectacle of too much weight for me.
Who sees Gods face, that is self-life, must die;
What a death were it then to see God die?

"...Though these things as I ride be from mine eye,
They're present yet unto my memory,
For that looks towards them; and Thou look'st towards me,
O Saviour, as Thou hang'st upon the tree.
I turn my back to thee but to receive
Corrections till Thy mercies bid Thee leave.
O think me worth Thine anger, punish me,
Burn off my rust, and my deformity;
Restore Thine image, so much, by Thy grace,
That Thou mayst know me, and I'll turn my face."

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