Wednesday, October 21st, 2009...2:59 pm
Calligraphy Slows
Fingers flying a tap dance on the keys,
clocked at a hundred words a minute,
the fastest email on earth.
I hit ’send’ and just as quick wish
I didn’t. Too quick
like my tongue and temper.
I search for the calligraphy set.
Where did I put that?
Too long since I picked up the pen
that requires slow.
I replace the empty ink cartridge
and wait. New ink flows
at its own pace;
this is not ball-point efficiency
but a nib that must feel the rough
of the page it passes over,
must know each fiber before leaving
the message of the ink.
I write the slow I want—
slow to anger
slow to speak
slow to judge
face-to-face encounters
looking in another’s eyes
the kind of slow that glorifies
the Father
who patiently waits.
(A High Calling Blogs Random Act of Poetry, as we celebrate slowing, for the writing prompt to make a “slow” word pool and write a poem from it. The word from my word pool I chose: calligraphy.
...to Know-Love-Obey God
7 Comments
October 22nd, 2009 at 10:10 am
I love that thought about the pen feeling the page it passes over. It is a poem in itself.
October 22nd, 2009 at 12:56 pm
Love this, monica! I have felt that slowing too, when I grab a pen instead of my laptop. It is becoming a lost art.
October 23rd, 2009 at 8:07 am
so true…
October 23rd, 2009 at 2:30 pm
slow to anger
slow to speak
slow to judge
mmmm…. yes, Lord, let it be.
October 23rd, 2009 at 3:44 pm
Loved this: “this is not ball-point efficiency
but a nib that must feel the rough
of the page it passes over.” I can hear it on the paper. Perfect.
October 23rd, 2009 at 5:22 pm
“a nib that must feel the rough”… love this line.
October 23rd, 2009 at 9:02 pm
“the pen/that requires slow.”
Love that you pulled out and entered a different kind of communication, of writing, of creating. Both pen and poetry help you “write the slow [you] want.”
It’s all so good, so *true*:
“slow to anger
slow to speak
slow to judge
face-to-face encounters
looking in another’s eyes
the kind of slow that glorifies
the Father
who patiently waits.”
Love it.
“the kind of slow that glorifies/the Father/who patiently waits.”
Even when we continue at top speed, He waits.
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