O, Holy Fetus,
One cell, two cells,
Cell upon cell,
You took shape,
Within the Virgin’s womb.
O Holy Child,
Born to die,
You were born in Bethlehem
City of Promise,
But conceived in Nazareth,
Crossroad of sinners,
Now graced
By the Holy.
Cell upon cell,
Grace upon grace,
The Virgin’s
“Fiat”
Alleluia!
Copyright Joann Nelander 2012
All rights reserved
In flight
Into Egypt
Hungry,
Hurried,
Yet at peace.
You pass my way.
Because you are holy
We are worlds apart.
Yet you touch me
By your plight.
You must eat.
You must drink.
Rest a moment
Under my tent.
Holy visitors,
Let me wash your feet.
Your smiles
Enter my heart
As a symphony
Stay the night.
Bring the star
From heaven
To light my adobe.
Dwell forever
Here in Spirit
Though you must hurry
On your way.
Journey on,O, Protector,
O Mother, O Child.
With me,
In your hearts,
Now, I wait
For you forever.
I tucked a little rattle
Under His blanket.
Perhaps, He’ll hear me
In the sounds,
A remembrance,
Like a prayer,
In the rattling of beads.
By Joann Nelander
Be, O Lord, the Sun in me.
Despite, my clouds,
Masking Your Beauty,
Be seen as light invisible,
Going forth, in the Spirit,
To the world,
A world in need of Revelation.
Pierce the veil of my travail.
Linger long to suffer my malaise,
My unsettled wine.
By grace, bless me,
As you bless those
Blind to Your Presence in me.
Sacrament and penance,
My claim upon Your Heart.
Light, undiminished,
Under my bushel,
Burning bright within my core,
Make of me a lampstand,
In Your Father’s House.
Be, O, Lord,
The Sun in Me,
To a world in need of illumination.
Copyright Joann Nelander 2012
All rights reserved
You, the indwelling God of the faithful,
Have called me
"The apple of Your eye",
Look, therefore,
Out upon my world,
And bless those about me,
Good and bad.
Bless them not,
Because I see and intercede,
But because You see,
And, beholding their misery,
Reach out.
Being that You are Compassion,
Change my world,
Person by person,
Day by day.
See through me,
As the pupil of Your eye.
Use me as Your window
On my world.
Your Presence in me
Is as the Sun in the heavens,
Shining out,
And penetrating even the clouds
I place in Your way.
"In Your Light,
We see Light. "
Copyright Joann Nelander 2011
All rights reserved
Pick me up, dear Mother
Your visit means so much to me.
O, how I need a mother.
I gaze at your image,
And you engrave it on my heart.
The beating of my heart,
Reminds me of my mortality,
And how you were
At a moment in time, Mary,
The young virgin with Child, in Nazareth,
Living life on earth
As I do now.
O, how I wish to live
In your purity
And simplicity of heart.
Here I am
At your feet in supplication,
Pleading peace,
That I might live
In the spirit of Shalom.
Here is my kiss.
Remember me,
As You gaze on your Son.
Engrave my name upon His heart,
As your fire of love blazes
In His presence.
I am love,
Awaiting the embrace of Love.
Copyright Joann Nelander 2012
At the moment
You lift Your saintly friends
From the Earth,
And plant them
In the Heaven of Your Being,
At that precious moment,
And by that fateful act,
You endow
The sons and daughters
Of Your Covenant,
Remaining in this world,
With more,
Not less.
When Your friends
Journey forth,
All the Earth
Is, henceforth, blessed,
And not, otherwise,
Disposed or deprived.
As Your Servants,
Enter Your Realms of Light,
Their charisms become infinite,
In their capacity to bless.
When the smallest of the small
Cries out,
In the name of Your forever Friends,
These other Christs
Answer with Your power to succor.
In the Now of Your Essence,
They share Your Glory.
In Heaven,
There is only one glory,
Which cannot increase.
United to You,
Who, are unchanging,
This new rain falls to
the Earth,
And it’s consenting
creatures, here,
Can and do change,
In the shower
Of Your abundant dew fall.
We are, henceforth,
The beneficiaries of new riches,
Streaming from Your Side,
The Door, by which Your saints
Entered Eternity.
Glory upon glory falls,
As golden droplets,
Upon the land
Of sunrise and sunset.
Your gifts do not cease
With the death
Of those who are Yours.
Heaven is united to earth,
And in the celebration
Of their new birth,
Rejoices.
©2012 Joann Nelander
Who has died and gone to the side of Christ,
That does not make intercession,
For all the people
He has failed in life?
Who can stand in Purgatory’s flame,
And cease to cry out
For loved ones
Left in Time?
God hears the cry of the poor,
And who is poorer
Than the abandoned,
And detained at the threshold of Heaven,
Awaiting the forgiveness of those,
Who are careless of their fate?
No one goes to Heaven alone.
The cleansed and the holy,
Grab the tassles
Of your prayer shawl.
Lower your eyes.
Beat your breast.
Forget yourself.
Remember the family of God.
Together let us
Praise the Living God,
Who waits in Mercy for mercy,
For He calls all
To be His own.
©2012 Joann Nelander
Heavenly Mother,
It is told,
You allowed a leper babe,
To be washed in your Baby’s bath,
And, immediately, the infant was healed,
His skin, supple and pink,
By an act of God,
A miraculous gift.
Plunge those forgotten in life,
Into that water of refreshment,
In which, to remove the dust of the world,
You bathed your Babe.
It is God, Who hears,
The cry of the poor.
God, Who, is not far off.
He sent His Christ,
To enter that sea,
The Jordan of Man’s Sin.
One day, it’s waters
Would wash the multitudes,
And it’s streams
Flow over the Ages.
God, indeed, hears
The cry of the poor,
As He heard the wail
Of the leper babe.
“This is my beloved Son.”,
He announces in loving unity,
As an open invitation for us to enter in,
And lay our claim in holy hope.
Mother, do for the disabled,
What they cannot
Do for themselves.
Meet us in our leprosy,
And, bathing us, say
With the Father,
“This is my son,
In whom I am well pleased.”
© 2012 Joann Nelander
All rights reserved
Forsaking the Land of Shadows, yet again,
And prostrate before You,
I enter with my candle,
Wick, barely alive,
Smoldering,
Awaiting the gentle breeze,
That will kindle my flame
To blaze forth, anew.
Praise rises in my soul,
As a lifetime of thanks given,
Recall to memory
The reason for my trust.
Can Faith be called blind,
When a thousand thousand yesterdays
Form the foundation of our friendship?
Now, I look upon You,
Upon the Altar of Adoration.
Beauty captures my attention.
The monstrance, a delight to my eye,
All aglow,
As it catches the early rays of morning.
Golden shafts stream from its center,
Whispering "Glory."
The pedestal,
Ornate with pomegranates, grapes and lilies,
Celebrate the gift of Your Creation.
Yet, You, in Your splendid Humility,
Reside in true beauty, Unadorned, and at rest,
Your work accomplished,
Awaiting only my disfigurement.
What will You with me?
Transfigure in longed for alchemy of Spirit.
By heartfelt confession and remorse,
At Your Word,
Spoken in Persona Christi,
I wash my robes clean
In the Blood of the Lamb.
You do not horde Your beauty,
But send it forth,
To renew all creation,
And, forgetting not the least,
Remember me.
Copyright 2012 Joann Nelander
Words are swirling
Like leaves,
Lifted heavenward,
On bursts of emotion,
Only to settle quietly,
As the storm of love passes
Into Abiding Presence.
By Joann Nelander
“Who do you say I am?”
Jesus asked.
Who do you say I am?
The jars lined the walls.
Each one marked:
A weight and words,
“Products of conception.”
Parts, just parts!
Parts, just parts?
Who do you say I am?
©2012 Joann Nelander
H/T Julia : Golgotha of Jasna Gora – Artist: Jerzy Duda Gracz
Here a bit more information about the images.
In the shrine at Czestochowa, upstairs from the famous icon of the Black Madonna, a 21st-century Way of the Cross reminds us that our real enemy is not the evil outside of us but the sin within us. In March 2001, the late Polish painter Jerzy Duda Gracz presented the monastery at Jasna Gora, one of the most popular pilgrimage sites in the world, with new Stations of the Cross. Gracz named these paintings after Golgotha, the mountain where Jesus was crucified, but many of the landscapes and faces he included in them are eerily recognizable to present-day viewers.
St. Gertrude Prayer:
Lord Jesus Christ, I accept this sleep in the spirit of love with which Thou didst sanctify it when Thou didst deign to sleep in Thy most sacred humanity, to the glory of God the Father, and for the salvation of all mankind; beseeching that, in union with Thee, it may tend to increase in grace and glory of all Thine Elect in heaven, on earth, and in purgatory.
Amen.
Lift me to Your shoulder;
Carry me, henceforth.
I can see all things in a new way,
From my throne above the world.
Your Shepherd’s crook in view,
A sign of assurance,
Calming the sea, defeating the flesh,
Vanquishing the Foe.
Perched in Paradise,
I ride above the storm.
Battles won by stillness,
Flames quenched by Water from the Rock.
Carrying the one You love,
Bearing Your burden,
Loving Your labor,
Loving me.
I see the wound of Your Cross.
I see Blood,and Bone,
And I see me,
Carved in flesh,
As you carry me,
Onward and upward,
Onto greater heights.
© 2012 Joann Nelander
I held the ocean to my ear.
I heard it speak with peaceful roar,
And hearing I went off,
Leaving on the shore,
The secret of His presence,
But not forgetting,
What He had said
In that moment of Eternity,
Which is forever
Yet, not of Time.
© 2012 Joann Nelander
Darkness, fleeing at the approach of Promise,
Star bright and resplendent,
The Sun, illuminating the Virgin’s womb,
Making of it a palace
Fit for a king, a King of Kings.
Light bright angel,
Carrying her “Fiat” heavenward,
Enfolding humility, modesty and obedience,
In the gold of innocence and virtue.
Most High overshadowing,
Virgin most pure and lowly,
Conceiving by privilege,
Godhead and Son of Man.
© 2012 Joann Nelander
God is.
God is waiting for me.
He woos me.
He thirsts.
God thirsts
For my thirsting for Him
Here in the Now,
I Am.
I Am in mystery.
I Am in darkness.
Being of Light,
Overshadowed, as by a cloud,
As driving in the dark,
Seeing darkly,
Perceiving indistinctly,
All senses at high pitch.
Unify the threads of day.
Compose my hours
To sing one song.
Bathe me anew.
Let me swim in You.
Alive to Presence.
Awake in repose.
Listening.
I know You in fullness,
Fully and abundantly.
I know You
In the fullness of my emptiness,
Robed in the fullness of my sorrow,
In the fullness of my grief,
In the fullness of my joy and plenty,
In rapture,
Sweetly knowing
And by Love known.
© 2012 Joann Nelander
Old year passes,
Becoming yet another ghost,
Withered as leaves,
Crumbled, and carried aloft
By winter winds,
Too soon scattered
By the breezes of Time.Is it truly spent,
Dead and long forgotten,
Living but in memory?
May not reflection
Call it from the grave,
Uncover the gain
Hold it fast
To live again?How has its many waters
Blessed thee and me,
As sacred signs?
Will it, as muse, retain a power
For its having been,
And then no more?What saints and angels
Sent my way,
Colored its day?
In sorrow,
Who came to hold my hand?
In joy,
Who shared my hearth?Were there hugs, and smiles,
And laughter to tilt the scale of grief?
Can kisses and embraces be resurrected,
That fires of love be stoked
To warm and blaze anew?Has my thanksgivings
Been recorded in the pyre,
Written in the embers now glowing
As tiger eyes flashing from the ash.Years come, doomed , too soon to go,
But let them not hurry
To a crypt without a wake.
Drink the happy wine of memory,
Sip, as the seasons turn.
Contemplate and savor
The seasons of your soul.©2011 Joann Nelander
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