David Maria Turoldo—from "The Sixth Angel"
Christmas Morning
1.
I want to give something to the Lord
but I don't know what.
I'll walk the streets
whistling like this,
until people say: he's mad!
I'll linger especially with the children
playing on the outskirts,
and then I'll leave a flower
at every poor window
and greet everyone I meet along the way
bowing down to the ground.
And then I'll ring
the bells on the tower with my own hands
again and again
until I'm exhausted.
And to whoever comes—
even the rich—I'll say:
sit at my table,
(the rich man too is a poor man).
And I'll ask everyone:
have you seen the Lord?
But I'll say it in silence
and only with a smile.
2.
I want to give something to the Lord,
but I don't know what.
Everything is his gift
except our sin.
So I'll give him an icon
where he—a child—gazes
into his mother's eyes:
then he'll forget all else.
I'll gather for him from the meadow
a drop of dew
and then I'll ask him to guess
whether it's a tear
or a pearl of sunlight
or a drop of dew.
And I'll say to people:
have you seen the Lord?
But I'll say it in silence
and only with a smile.
3.
I want to give something to the Lord,
but I don't know what.
I don't even believe in my own tears anymore,
and these joys are all so meager:
I'll put a red carnation on the balcony
I'll sing a song
for him alone.
I'll go into the woods tonight
and embrace the trees
and listen to the nightingale,
that nightingale that sings only
from midnight to dawn.
And then I'll go wash myself in the river
and at dawn I'll pass by the doors
of all my brothers and sisters
and say to each house: "peace!"
I want to give something to the Lord,
but I don't know what.
And I won't cry anymore
won't cry uselessly anymore;
I'll only say: have you seen the Lord?
and I'll say it in silence
Poems from il Roveto
Read also: Il Roveto
Hunger
The empty mouth
of my soul
is drawn
fervently
toward the radiant
breast of God.
Laura Galasso
What Will He Find?
What will the Son of Man find
when he is born tonight?
Will he find the frost of selfishness?
Will he find the cold of hatred?
Will he find the dampness of indifference?
In simple and pure hearts
he will still find a "dwelling"
that can warm him
from the frost, from the cold
and from the world's dampness.
Maria Grazia Micheli
But in Your Will
I do not know how to rest
upon the wood of your bed, to bring
my mind and my lips
to the places
of your burning word.
I do not know
how to retrace with my life
the concrete features
of your incarnation
among us and within us,
to satisfy
in the poverty of my flesh
the supreme wounds of your love. I do not know
how to fix my gaze
in your infinities,
to give you whole my virginity
I do not know.
But in your will,
in your mercy
free and stubborn,
I lift up my courage
and I come to you as a beggar for an advance
on that eternal hour
of our complete wedding.
L.G.
Read also: We Four of Comunità il Roveto
God and I
To climb the cross with hard labor
to clasp it
to clasp it
with tender strength and rest
with him.
L.G.