Christian Viewpoint: Moving poems from the past are still as relevant today
I was moved by two poems we read recently at Rhymes Recollected, our church online poetry group – both associated with last century’s world wars, writes John Dempster.
One was by Geoffrey Studdert Kennedy, an army chaplain in World War I, dubbed Woodbine Willie because of his generous gifts to soldiers of Woodbine cigarettes.
His poem Trees describes branches stripped of leaves in autumn. Gaunt and bare, they “mourn their beauty that is past”. The trees stand through the long winter “all uncomplaining” because (the poet imagines) “they know that Life is there”.
Woodbine Willie applies this to his own life, praying that as he faces old age “which strips off the joys of youth” he may remain as “true to spring” as the trees, allowing the challenges of frailty to draw his soul “nearer to the truth”.
Finally, he seeks as was his pastoral duty to comfort men facing death in battle: “The youth that goes like the red June rose shall burst to bloom in Paradise.” There is resurrection beyond death: the soldiers should not despair but live in the light of that coming spring.
The second poem dates from the final year of World War II. It was written by German pastor, writer and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer, one of the leaders of the Confessing Church within Germany which took a stand against Hitler.
Eventually, Bonhoeffer was imprisoned, and among his prison writings left the self-revelatory poem Who am I? He tells us that outwardly he appears to be coping with imprisonment “calmly” and even “cheerfully”. He talks “freely and friendly” to his warders. He bears “the days of misfortune equably, smilingly, proudly”.
In contrast, he is inwardly “restless and longing and sick”, thirsting “for words of kindness, for neighbourliness”. He is “weary and empty at praying, at thinking, at making”.
And he wonders, which Dietrich is the true Dietrich? Is he a failure, feeling as he does? Is he a hypocrite, assuming an unperturbed façade? There is no answer to these questions, but the poem concludes with the healing recognition that: “Whoever I am, O God, I am thine.”
And as he walked calm and prayerful to his execution, was his inner self still at sea with confusion, or was he granted in the face of death a clarity and peace?
Bonhoeffer was no hypocrite, for in acting in the light of what he believed to be true, despite his inner struggles, he was living in Woodbine Willie’s words “true to spring”.
We have known again the coming of this season of rebirth after a hard, dark winter. May we, as Christian people follow the example of these two fine human beings and remain, whatever may happen “true to spring”, our identity rooted in God’s love.
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