Anne Higgins

Digging for God


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      Digging for God

      Praying with Poetry

      Anne M. Higgins

      Illustrations by Maureen Beitman

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      Digging for God

      Praying with Poetry

      Copyright © 2010 Anne M. Higgins. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical publications or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher. Write: Permissions, Wipf and Stock Publishers, 199 W. 8th Ave., Suite 3, Eugene, OR 97401.

      Resource Publications

      An Imprint of Wipf and Stock Publishers

      199 W. 8th Ave., Suite 3

      Eugene, OR 97401

      www.wipfandstock.com

      ISBN 13: 978-1-60899-807-4

      EISBN 13: 978-1-4982-7290-2

      Manufactured in the U.S.A.

      All scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New American version, NAB, copyright 1971, by Catholic Publishers, Inc.

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      The best place to find God is in a garden.You can dig for him there.

      —George Bernard Shaw.

      Acknowledgments

      “Tribute Poem” How the Hand Behaves Finishing Line Press 2009

      “Second Antiphon in the Style of Hildegard” NCR February 21,2003

      “Sister Anne Robb Writes a Letter” How the Hand Behaves; COMMONWEAL October 11,2002

      “Go out to the Woods and Feel the Tree Bark” How the Hand Behaves Finishing Line Press 2009

      “Sitz im Leben” SISTERS TODAY November 1983

      “The Roofless Church” ANTIGONISH REVIEW Summer, 1982

      “Rain on the Hedgerows” At the Year’s Elbow Wipf& Stock Publications 2006

      “Junk Drawer” Scattered Showers in a Clear Sky PlainView Press 2007

      “The Snake Plant” WELLSPRING Winter 2001

      “The Rose in the Chapel” NCR October 19, 2007

      “Thomas Merton Checks on His Trees” WINDHOVER Spring, 2002

      “Angry Enough to Die” LALITAIMBA

      “Saying the Rosary” WINDHOVER Spring, 2002

      “Garden Gloves Huddled” How the Hand Behaves Finishing Line Press 2009

      “Heliotrope” SISTERS TODAY November 1981

      “Perennials” How the Hand Behaves Finishing Line Press 2009

      “Six” UMBRELLA Fall 2008

      ”At the Lake that was once a Volcano” THE MARS HILL REVIEW #20, 2002

      Eden

      Genesis 2:8–9

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      Tribute Poem

      Praise for late sleeping day,

      waking up without alarm,

      for corkscrews,

      corkscrew call of

      yellowing lustful goldfinches,

      butter,

      opposable thumbs,

      lusciously plush perfume

      of viburnum

      blooming in the woods

      just now

      just now.

      Name five events, situations, or experiences that you appreciate—

      go for the ordinary and undramatic ones.

      Write a poem of praise to God for them.

      Second Antiphon in the Style of Hildegard

      O You who squeeze the wind

      until she howls,

      who wring the rain until

      she gushes,

      send electric waves

      rushing through the cord

      to jolt the vacuum cleaner

      to roaring life,

      I praise your power

      moving in the homeliest of things.

      Roses on couch cushions,

      lamp stands, small city gardens,

      bath water slipping down the drain,

      steel wool scouring egg crust off the iron frying pan.

      List five objects in your everyday life that you would call “the homeliest things.”

      What gift does each of them have for you?

      Sister Anne Robb Writes a Letter

      Having turned in my stamps,

      signed on to silence,

      I dream

      the old friends

      open their empty mailboxes.

      In dreams,

      they come to visit,

      dressed oddly,

      staring and shy.

      In dreams,

      they shout out to me

      from the other end of the church.

      I trace their names

      in the sand of my palm

      and God

      washes them

      into Himself

      Imagine yourself on the seashore, writing a letter to God in the sand.

      What do you say?

      Summer Morning in the kitchen at Seton House

      Sitting at the small square table

      facing the window, refugee

      from the country of longing

      where clouds of grief

      obscure the mountains,

      country cooled by sorrow, heated by dread,

      blasted by gusts of panic,

      I finger the coffee cup.

      Here, the weather is more benevolent.

      Mild winds ruffle the oak tree.

      The lavish sun ripens

      hydrangeas and raspberries.

      The intimate sound

      of the hummingbird’s

      arrival at the feeder

      interrupts my fragile silence.

      Sit at your kitchen table at a quiet, solitary time. Pay attention to your surroundings— to what you eat and drink.