Joy in Our Hearts-- Lots of It

I listened to music while laboring with both my babies. With Eowyn, the song I most remember (the one playing as she was born, actually) is Sandra McCracken's "Close of the Day"-- fittingly a song about all the simple blessings of life -- "close of the day/ fireworks and rain, feels like a holiday/ unburdens my frame"-- as well as the deep blessings of the Gospel-- " the marks of my name/ torn into Your Hands" --with the refrain "and this is not what I deserve." Really perfect to remember as I contemplated the joy of bringing forth a child contrasted with the Hell I'd have earned myself with all my sin, as well as the far greater pain He went through for me!

Anyway... the song that will always remind me of Liam's birth is Sara Groves' "Joy is in Our Hearts." It's got a great tempo, great contemplative, calm, intense vibe that is perfect for the work of labor. And the words... wow, the words are great for the discomfort, pain and trial of waiting that is the last stage of pregnancy and all of labor. It's also been perfect for me as a new mom full of fears: once you've been given such a precious gift, it's easy to fall prey to the temptation that it will be taken from you. This song helps me remember that even if I lost my little son or worse, I would have Christ, and Him for all eternity!- and that would be reason enough to sing for joy. This song was written, I think, with the persecuted church in mind.

 I pray this little montage encourages you! I get teary just watching it. :) Pregnancy and labor are good for my spiritual condition. Which means we'll probably be having more kids.

"Joy Is in Our Hearts"

"We were pressed on every side,
Full of fear and troubled thoughts;
For good reason we carried heavy hearts

"It is good to come together
In our friendship to remember
All the reasons hope is in our hearts:

Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
Christ our joy and strength!

"Now with patience in our suffering,

Perseverance in our prayers,

With good reason this hope is in our hearts:
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!

Christ our joy and strength!

"Oh, we saw the face of angels--

Many good things well-secured

For good reason this joy is in our hearts:

Hallelujah! Hallelujah!

Christ our joy and strength!

For good reason joy is in our hearts."

Pearls of Pain

I've been working on a post on brokenness and creativity- on the part grief & loss plays on our ability to tell Stories... but... it will have to wait.  My sister called, and two hours later, I'm even more tired than I was before (though I have even more to think about- sisters are good for that). =D  A line from a poem I'd written in college kept coming back to me, about how Jesus gathered up every broken bit of bread after He'd fed the 5000.  Such a picture of our Lord's intentionality in breaking:  He never breaks needlessly or wastefully.  Anyway, I dug through my old journals & found this in #30.  It was written as I watched a close friend allow her suffering & pain to pull her inward instead of outward, forfeiting the blessings she could both have and be.  It's not the greatest poem I've ever written by any stretch, but here it is. The imagery of pain as a pearl isn't all that bad-- pearls are formed through irritation, through pain-- and they benefit no one if kept within.  Best of all, though, is the idea that in our pain, we meet Him.  As Ben Patterson put it, "He is the treasure to be found in all that hurts us."  (Waiting)  A treasure meant not only for us, but for us to share.

"A Precious Pearl"

We sat and watched the falling rain
You near to me,
Yet sealed so tight--
Curled up around your pearl of pain.

Do you know my tears can fall?
That I cry out
And wrestle doubt,
Watching you weep there, in your wall?

You know it's precious in His sight?
A death, a cross,
A fruitful loss--
That pain that curls you up so tight.

I think of bread, by Galilee...
He never wastes
A thing He breaks,
But gathers it to useful be.

I think of Acts, how He decreed
His glorious Name
And Bride's delight
As end of every holy deed.

As left Hand takes, His right one gives,
His promise stands:
The one with Christ,
Though he have naught, yet full he lives.

A pearl of pain, of loss, of shame
So costly, so
Isolating--
Yet priceless, meant His grace to frame.

written June 20, 2005

Crucified for Joy

"I've tried more of me
and I come up dry
trading You for things-
things that go away.

My happiness

is found in less

of me and more,

more of You.

I have found the Answer is to know You

and be Loved by You alone.

You crucify me, and the world to me, 

and I will only boast in You."

 -Shane & Shane, "The Answer"

"Come, we that love the Lord,
And let our joys be known;
Join in a song with sweet accord,
And thus surround the throne.

We’re marching to Zion,
Beautiful, beautiful Zion;
We’re marching upward to Zion,
The beautiful city of God.

The sorrows of the mind
Be banished from the place;
Religion never was designed
To make our pleasures less."

-Isaac Watts & Robert Lowry, 1707 "Marching to Zion"

"He's [God] a hedonist at heart. All those fasts & vigils & stakes & crosses are only a facade. Or only like foam on the seashore. Out at sea, out in His sea, there is pleasure, and more pleasure. He makes no secret of it; at His right hand are "pleasures for evermore.""
-CS Lewis, The Screwtape Letters (Letter 22)

HutchMoot 2010

Last night around 11 pm, Ryan, Mark T. (a friend from church & neighbor), Eowyn & I got home from the first-ever Hutchmoot, a Christian Creativity conference (I don't really know how else to explain it) I probably should wait a few days to let everything percolate before posting about such a packed weekend...

(This was begun 3 weeks ago, and never finished...blame Paris & Copenhagen for the delay.)

The Hutchmoot began as the brain-child of Pete & Andrew Peterson, growing out of another of their brain children, the Rabbit Room, which is an online community of Storytellers-- artists of all stripes, be they culinary, literary, musical or visual. It in turn is modeled after the room where the Inklings (GK Chesterton, CS Lewis, JRR Tolkien, and other folks with real names instead of initials) met, a little room called "The Rabbit Room" at the Oxford pub, "The Eagle & Child."  Andrew Peterson beautifully tells the story of his trip to Oxford & London here.  I love that post because it resonates with me.  I, too, have walked the streets of Oxford, thinking of Aslan, and Harry Potter, and Luthien dancing for Beren, and of God's Severe Mercy in my life and everyone's... I've longed for artistic community, too.  I've felt the whispers of 1000 thoughts seep out of every cobbled stone as I walked the crooked High Street and listened to dozens of bells. 

And then I've come home, gotten married, had a baby, and felt every bit of poetry seep out of my bones.  Well, not every bit-- there are those moments, when I see my baby's glowing grin upon learning a new trick, when I feel the unspeakable Joy that is the precursor to every good poem-- and there certainly have been days of dark greyness, the deep Mourning of which is another heartbeat to True poetry.  Before I met Ryan, I wrote poems all the time.

I remember walking across campus as golden leaves danced in the wind, and feeling words building themselves to poetry in my mind.  I remember laughing with delight at the thought that God had ordained those very leaves to bring ME joy!  I think I lived more Coram Deo then (consciously before the face of God).  I remember using rhythm and rhyme to describe what I couldn't put into mere words; worship, youthful romance, truths teased and wrestled out of Scripture, desperate Hope in dark times, experiences and pleadings with various friends, especially one dearest to me.  Then, my junior year of college, my world imploded.  I have never known darker days, nor do I ever want to.  The Lord brought me through; He carried me, sad poetry and all.

I met Ryan the following summer, and began our fairy-tale-perfect courtship.  I remember sitting in my oh-so-picturesque apartment on St. James Ct, and trying to write a poem describing my journey from stubborn-trust-in-despair to amazed, thankful joy... and I couldn't. It was like I couldn't bear to write of happiness like I had written of grief... like I didn't want to put Ryan in the same category as those who had broken my heart. I put the pen down, and never picked it up again.  In 4 years I haven't written a single poem.  Nor a story... I've voraciously devoured good Stories, but never had the urge to write one.  Deep down, I still felt that I could write, but that I just didn't have any good Story to add.  I prayed "Lord, if you want me to write again, give me a Story or the drive to find one."  In the meantime, I was content using my story-telling ability to make the Testaments come to life for my preschoolers, SS class, VBS and middle school girls' Bible study.

Slowly, though, I've begun to miss written Storytelling.  As my daughter gets older, as my marriage gets both easier and harder, I want to leave a legacy of Story to carry others walking a similar road.  Lately, I've wanted to have a story to write, instead of just realizing I didn't have one.

Ryan writes stories like some people doodle.  He has all sorts of story-ideas, good ones too!, and he writes a character study here, a scene there, and that's it.  He's got fabulous ideas, and notebooks full of bits and pieces of tales I'd love to read... but nothing finished.  Oh, except the fairytale he wrote to ask me to marry him.  I guess he was a little more motivated to finish that one, seeing as how The Question was the ending.  It worked. ;)

We sure love Andrew Peterson, and all the original Rabbit Roomers (the Inklings).  We like to journal and blog, to talk and hear good stories.  Faith & imagination are the topics which first drew me to Ryan. We love reading and music and art fairs and thinking movies and hearing people's stories.  I'd been craving a bit of direction for my one remaining authorial outlet-- this blog-- and maybe this would provide some of that?  Besides, it would be something to do together, and that is usually a good thing.  And the Hutchmoot just sounded SO COOL!!  So we signed up to attend the Hutchmoot, and drove down to Nashville, literally still asking each other why exactly we were here while stuck in traffic on the Nashville turnpike.

After our first amazing meal, I felt like Charlie in Mr Wonka's chocolate factory (we'd just watched Johnny Depp's version the night before), as Mr. Wonka goes down the line of children, describing each one's claim to fame "And you're the little buggar who cracked the system!... You're the one who... You're the one that..."  Then he gets to Charlie: "And you're just lucky to be here, aren't you?"  Swallow.  Yup, that's me.  AP kept referring to us as "Rabbit Roomers" and most of the people we met were authors or aspiring ones, artists or movie critics... every one of THEIR blogs was cool and well-thought-out... and mine... does it even have a point?  And Ryan & I would just look at each other, and tend the baby.

This feeling continued throughout the weekend, but instead of feeling excluded, I felt completely inspired.  These people were people who felt, who appreciated so many of the same things that I do!  "Oh the joy of meeting one who knows the same poems as you!" I was reminded of so many stories I'd forgotten, and amazingly, every one of them brought to mind a friend (or myself) struggling with something.  Maybe in our counseling we should use more stories!!

I'll share the biggest "aha!" moment, then close this rambling tome...hopefully before Eowyn wakes up from her morning nap. :)  SD Smith, Travis Prinzi, and Pete Peterson did a session on struggle and imperfection as part of our characters called "Perfected in Weakness."  I believe it was Travis Prinzi (I'll check once I can get my notes from upstairs...after said baby awakes) who drove home the point that good outcomes ALWAYS come from mercy-God's mercy-, not our merit.  I tend to think that I just have to do the right thing, that when it really counts, I've GOT to obey, or else the gig is up. I tend to despair when I fail... again.  He brought up Lord of the Rings' ending.  Sam and Frodo have been so faithful, so obedient, and have brought the Ring through impossible hardship to the very brink of destruction.  Then, at the moment when obedience really matters-- when Frodo stands to cast it into the fires of Mt. Doom-- he fails.  Instead of casting it in, he negates his whole prior obedience by cradling it to himself, counting it more precious than the whole world and all its good. Gollum shows up and the two begin a fight to the death, as Travis put it, "that's my evil!" "no, MY evil!" "No, MY EVIL!" Great... lots of righteousness going on here... But then, Gollum-- his life spared by Mr. Bilbo out of sheer mercy-- saves them all.  By God's will, he slips and falls, clutching the Ring, into the fire, and both are destroyed.  Mercy, God's mercy, Mr. Bilbo's mercy, saved them all, not Frodo's obedience.  Wow.  Put THAT in your pipe and smoke it.

So I want to write now.  I remember that I don't have to have a great story-- just something that reflects The Story.  I don't have to have it all figured out.  I don't even have to obey perfectly (which is good because I don't)... I do have to cling to Mercy...though even then, It is clinging to me.

As you can see, we came home with LOTS of  new books, and I'm resolved to read with even more intentionality.  I'm starting up my old quote journal!  Ryan & I have been drawn closer by discussion of these things we both love. We've started to read together more, and to talk about our stories.  I keep hoping he'll post on how the Hutchmoot affected him. (nudge, nudge, honey) I've gotten several more great blogs on my BlogReader and they inspire me. I've also been inspired to seek beauty in all my work, even in little blog posts.  So I hope you will see more "every-day musing" style posts up here, and probably more organization in when I post on more topical...topics =D (i.e. Tuesdays- Theological Musings, or something of that sort), or at the very least better tags... We're motivated to get http://MamaSzrama.com/books up (that book review site I've mentioned) & running ASAP.I'm also even more excited about attending the Relevant 2010 Blogging conference!! I guess biggest of all, for both Ryan & I, is the desire to be more of a part of the amazing creative communit(ies) available to us.  I want to maximize our marriage's potential for creative community, maximize our Louisvillian surroundings and the similarly-inclined friends we already have here (you know who you are), and I want to be more available to the online communities I have- Rabbit Room, Relevant, and even this little webcorner, Eowyn's Heir.  I guess that's kind of why I went into so much background info, so that all of you reading this, from wherever you are, might know me a little more.  That's a scary thought... but I think it's part of every good story.  The protagonist has to be known, right?

Sweet Sailing on the Sea of Dreams

"Wynken, Blynken, and Nod"

Wynken, Blynken, and Nod, one night sailed off in a wooden shoe;
Sailed off on a river of crystal light into a sea of dew.
"Where are you going and what do you wish?" the old moon asked the three.
"We've come to fish for the herring fish that live in this beautiful sea.
Nets of silver and gold have we," said Wynken, Blynken, and Nod.

The old moon laughed and sang a song as they rocked in the wooden shoe.
And the wind that sped them all night long ruffled the waves of dew.
Now the little stars are the herring fish that live in that beautiful sea;
"Cast your nets wherever you wish never afraid are we!"
So cried the stars to the fishermen three - Wynken, Blynken, and Nod.

So all night long their nets they threw to the stars in the twinkling foam.

'Til down from the skies came the wooden shoe bringing the fisherman home.
'Twas all so pretty a sail it seemed as if it could not be.
Some folks say 'twas a dream they dreamed of sailing that misty sea.
But I shall name you the fisherman three - Wynken, Blynken, and Nod.

Now Wynken and Blynken are two little eyes and Nod is a little head.
And the wooden shoe that sailed the skies is a wee one's trundle bed.
So close your eyes while mother sings of the wonderful sights that be.
And you shall see those beautiful things as you sail on the misty sea,
Where the old shoe rocked the fishermen three - Wynken, Blynken, and Nod.

~by Eugene Field (published on March 9, 1889).

I think I'll memorize this so I can recite it to Éowyn when she's a little older and getting tucked into bed. =D

Fall, Glorious Fall!

SEASON of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend with apples the moss’d cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o’er-brimm’d their clammy cells.

~verse 1 of John Keats' "To Autumn" ... one of my favorite poems

Huber's Orchard & Winery is The farm around here for you-pick produce. In the summer, we go for berries of all kinds, and then peaches & nectarines. I really enjoy eating seasonally, especially when we're talking local produce. In the autumn, my tummy says it's time for pumpkins & apples! As one thing I've really missed in Louisville is picking my own apples, I was THRILLED to learn that I could pick them here, too! (I sure miss Hendersonville's Apple Festival and Skytop Orchard back home, though... and the good ol' SC peaches come summertime.) The "Mothers & Others" group from church went to Huber's on Wednesday, and I went too-- my first outing with my daughter in my arms instead of in my belly.

I came late (mornings are not so good for us these days, and I wanted to get in her 10 am feeding so I wouldn't have to feed her first thing there... either in a field or in some obscure corner. Fernanda waited for me, so I went apple picking with her & her 2 darlings-- Elia & Matias. I loved getting to speak & hear some spanish with them! (Fernanda's from Ecuador)








Afterwards, we pulled out our picnic lunches & joined several other friends from church in a picnic by the lake. It was fun to watch the kids feed the ducks & geese, and make a "construction site" with the cones left nearby while we adults chatted (I'm still amazed to find myself in the latter category rather than the former, by the way).

Dozin' in the sun.

Mercifully, she had an uneventful, peaceful feeding. I think she likes picnics.

Her "being-burped" face

Next to the pumpkin cart. I bought a big one & two little ones. For now they are decorating our mantle. Eventually, they will fill our bellies as pumpkin bread, pumkin-chocolate-chip muffins, pumpkin pies, pumpkin spice lattes, and who knows what other pumpkin-y treats I can devise! And the apples are WONDERFUL-- crisp & juicy like I like 'em!
(the pink is from mine & Eowyn's birthdays... I haven't wanted to take it down, lol)

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap’d furrow sound asleep,
Drows’d with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,—
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

...now putting on recording of madrigals; fall makes me think of madrigals, too... no idea why. Maybe because it reminds me of my Furman days, and Furman makes me think of vibrant dancing leaves by the lake as I walked fast to class. Always fast-- less cold that way. :) (wow... I forgot I used to SING like this! Oh, I MISS IT!!!)

A Poem from Way Back When

...back when I actually tried to write poetry. I put my pen down one day and never have even tried to pick it back up. I'm surprised I don't miss it-- it used to be SO MUCH a part of how I processed thoughts and made sense of the world. Anyway, this came out of WB Yeats poem "Adam's Curse," as well as the book Celebrating the Sabbath, which explains how the 4th command brings ALL work under the Lordship of God: "Six days you SHALL LABOR and do all your work." There are also references to Isaiah in it. I hadn't read this poem in quite a while, so... here it is. :)

"Marked Out By the Hands"

(places that are still in question in italics)
Calloused hands between my own--
Young, strong athletic hands—
Ready to go and conquer or find—
A hundred or more perfect plans.
Yet hidden in a pocket, they
Twist and clench as if to say
"I'm sorry that I'm work-worn,
I'm sorry that I'm rough.
I spend my days a wagèd slave
I know it's not enough."

A Voice rang out o'er dew-pearled grass
"You work it—till it—love."
And the First Man leapt to tend it,
That Garden from above.
And though he would with anguish tell
Of the day he and our Mother fell,
His sons to now are still marked out—
"The Image-bearing band"—
By the marks of work and labor;
By the callous on your hand.

Yet let your labor be distinct,
Not meaningless or vain.
For with a Purpose Adam's Son
Came [and toiled] to reverse the Shame.
Let the song upon your smile say
"I walk and work a better way."
Of old, the prophet told us,
A man would mark his hand:
Not as a pagan calls his god,
But "Yahweh's"—a grain of Sand.

There is no shame in labor done
For the Joy before our heart—
The Seventh Sanctified Sunrises
Make holy every honest art.
Live and work, in our today,
As a re-molded work of clay:
You're marked as bound for glory,
As a stranger in the land
Of the very soil you till at—
By the name carved on His Hand.

Life itself has rough-housed by.
The wrinkled hands I hold
Have caught and clenched their share of it,
Then freely beshowered their gold.
Beckoning now, wide open, they
Embrace and call as if to say
"I learned that life is toil and sweat—
I learned that work is good.
I followed the Carpenter who died [marked His hands]
Upon the Sacred Wood."

Written 12/13/05 (my junior year at Furman!!)