Summertide Rhythms
“To bear new life or learn to live is an exacting joy.”
— Anne Ridler, from “Christmas and the Common Birth”
I took the long, the thoughtful way to
The corner, and the park there. Hearts bear
The things too heavy for the hands; but new
Rhythms wait: they are found things, and to be sought. Life
Becomes, blooming from the formless dust or
Greening, grinning, from woken boughs to learn
Again — for so we must — to
Know afresh: the summer glows in winter’s breast. A live
And living thing, throbbing with expectancy is
She. — On the long way to the park I see an
Answer-expectant, breath-holding, love-exacting,
Springing-from-the-ashes joy.
–Tyler Rogness
PhiLiP SchMidT
Dear Tyler:
At the start of the new year, my wife and I began attending a Presbyterian church.
A good number of the hymns that we sing are entirely new to us.
Sometimes, an entire hymn will resonate with me, sweeping me away in its transcendence.
Other times, a single stanza will ‘leap off the page’ at me, begging further contemplation.
Poetry affects me in a similar way.
Sometimes I need to ‘plumb the depths’ of an entire poem in order to ‘get it.’
But in the case of ‘Summertide Rhythms,’ one solitary line of verse ‘leapt off the page’ at me and grabbed me by the throat:
“Hearts bear
The things too heavy for the hands; but new
Rhythms wait: they are found things, and to be sought.”
So then:
When my heart is broken into a thousand pieces, it’s not the end of the story…..
Even though it feels like it is.
Are you saying that “new rhythms” are waiting in the wings to be sought and discovered, even at times when it feels like the bottom has fallen out of my world?
If so…..
How do I develop the mindset to seek after these “new rhythms” that are meant to be found…..
When my world has been shattered, and I don’t seem to have the inclination – or capacity – to care about anything?
Or rather, are these “new rhythms” in fact my ticket OUT of the “valley of the shadows”?
I am fascinated by your Godly thinking here. I would hear more of this.
Inquisitively,
PhiL >^•_•^<
Tyler Rogness
Hi Phil,
Thanks for taking the time to interact with this poem! I’m honored by your appreciation of it. I resonate with your questions as well, those being much the same as I was wrestling with as I wrote “Summertide Rhythms.”
Despite the title, the poem has a lot to do with winter. “Life becomes,” joy springs, and the boughs wake, but they only do so “from the formless dust”; and from the ashes. In the particular bottom-off-the-world experience that led to this poem, it was enough for me to pause and know that “new rhythms wait,” and that just below the wintry crust and “formless dust” of my experience, seeds of life were there “waiting in the wings,” to use your words. Though I tend to look for a ticket out of my challenges, I personally find some comfort knowing there’s hope brewing beneath the surface, even if I can’t see it. That alone has been enough to give me the courage at times to keep on, and to seek out those new rhythms.
That may not be the most complete answer ever given, but I hope it’ll suffice as a continuation of the conversation. I’d love to hear what other thoughts or questions this might bring up for you.
Thanks again for the comment!