"Transfix us with love."

[hermionesviolin]

My 15-year (virtual) College Reunion was this weekend, and one of the few bits of not pre-recorded programming was the class-specific "webinar" -- which turned into a regular Zoom (they upgraded us all to panelists) and was largely just catching up. It started out kind of awkward but ended up being mostly kind of lovely.

Jennifer Walters was the Dean of Religious Life when I was at Smith, and she's now Dean of the College at Bryn Mawr, but she was bonus surprise on our Zoom.  I had not realized/had forgotten that she started at Smith in 2001 with us, so she's sort of honorary class of '05.  She started at Bryn Mawr in 2016, so this year's graduates were her first class at Bryn Mawr, just like we were her first class at Smith.

She read us this poem, from a collection she was reading when she started at Smith (Joy Harjo's The Woman Who Fell from the Sky):

The Creation Story

I'm not afraid of love
or its consequence of light.
 
It's not easy to say this
or anything when my entrails
dangle between paradise
and fear.
 
I am ashamed
I never had the words
to carry a friend from her death
to the stars
correctly.
 
Or the words to keep
my people safe
from drought
or gunshot.
 
The stars who were created by words
are circling over this house
formed of calcium, of blood
 
this house
in danger of being torn apart
by stones of fear.
 
If these words can do anything
if these songs can do anything
I say bless this house
with stars.
 
Transfix us with love.

Comments

[musesfool]

I really like that poem.