Mount Of Olives

A fragment of earth seen through leaves,

through the thicket of time, at last through the brook

that covers the bottom of a slender chalice.

The chalice was formed from a crack in the rocks.

-

A fragment of earth seen still through You,

or is it through me?

The dwarfed olive trees where You

could not find shelter then, nor–

And today, why do I come?

Don’t be surprised. Here for one thousand

nine hundred years each gaze passes

into that one gaze which never alters.

- Saint John Paul II

Song of the Brightness of Water

From this depth—I came only to draw water

in a jug—so long ago, this brightness

still clings to my eyes—the perception I found,

and so much empty space, my own

reflected in the well.

Yet it is good. I can never take all of you

into me. Stay then as a mirror in the well.

Leaves and flowers remain, and each astonished gaze

brings them down

to my eyes transfixed more by light

than by sorrow.

-Saint John Paul II, 1950 

The Source

The undulating wood slopes down
to the rhythm of mountain streams....
If you want to find the source,
you have to go up, against the current,
tear through, seek, don't give up,
you know it must be somewhere here.
Where are you, source? Where are you, source?!

Silence....
Stream, stream in the wood,
tell me the secret of your beginning!

(Silence—why are you silent?
How carefully you have hidden the secret of your beginning).

Allow me to wet my lips
in spring water,
to feel its freshness,
reviving freshness.

-Blessed John Paul II