Category: Poems

What is hell, if not the anguish – Advent 2

What is hell, if not the anguish
heaped on those whom humankind
treat with hatred and derision,
harsh disdain that we’ve refined?

Images of fire and torture
stalk among us while we live,
not in some dark, distant future,
but in love we fail to give.

So the cry of disaffected,
disregarded human souls,
indicate the dereliction
chosen through our human polls.

We are architects of anguish
when we seek to put aside,
love of those God calls our neighbour,
those ignored that we deride.

Andrew Pratt 4/12/2019
Words © 2019 Stainer & Bell Ltd, London, England, http://www.stainer.co.uk.
Please include any reproduction for local church use on your CCL Licence returns. All wider and any commercial use requires prior application to Stainer & Bell Ltd.

Matthew 3: 1-12
Psalm 88

Wreath laying…Remembrance

Wreath laying…

So easy now to judge:
that one was right,
another wrong.

But we were never there
in the narrow trench
or corridor of power.
We never heard the thunder’s fire,
nor found ourselves
strung up upon the wire.
We never had to make that bleak decision
consigning one to death,
another to derision.

Our innocence is born of inexperience,
our wisdom consummated in our ignorance.

And if the clocks turned back,
were we to tread where men,
now dead,
once walked,
would we be just as speedy to deride,
or criticise the ones we said once lied?

Dear God,
give generosity of thought
to read the pages history have wrought;
to look with eyes of grace into that time,
to fathom truth and reason
in that jagged, harrowed rhyme.

Then let our lines not ridicule the dead,
for, but for grace,
we might repeat their acts,
yes, but for grace,
we might yet taste their dread.
© Andrew Pratt 2014

Remembrance – so easy now to judge

So easy now to judge:
that one was right,
another wrong.

But we were never there
in the narrow trench
or corridor of power.
We never heard the thunder’s fire,
nor found ourselves
strung up upon the wire.
We never had to make that bleak decision
consigning one to death,
another to derision.

Our innocence is born of inexperience,
our wisdom consummated in our ignorance.

And if the clocks turned back,
were we to tread where men,
now dead,
once walked,
would we be just as speedy to deride,
or criticise the ones we said once lied?

Dear God,
give generosity of thought
to read the pages history have wrought;
to look with eyes of grace into that time,
to fathom truth and reason
in that jagged, harrowed rhyme.

Then let our lines not ridicule the dead,
for, but for grace,
we might repeat their acts,
yes, but for grace,
we might yet taste their dread.
© Andrew Pratt 2014

What sharp protestations might echo the prophets – hymn at the time of parliamentary disagreement

What sharp protestations might echo the prophets,
could mirror the actions of Christ and the cross?
We witness indifference, inaction and malice,
that break up communities, add to our loss.

But how can we counter political action
that builds upon selfishness slander and lies,
that blinds us to suffering, homelessness, hunger,
ignoring these needs as our barren earth dies?

While violence surrounds us, our dark contemplation
breeds hopelessness, helplessness, absence of light;
yet here in the darkness a spark might still smoulder,
that love might still fan to dispel hatred’s night.

Join hands now, God’s people, let love be our watchword,
let Christ be our model of life giving grace,
that those of each nation, the war torn, the migrant,
may find they are welcome right now in this place.

Andrew Pratt 31/8/2019
Words © 2019 Stainer & Bell Ltd, London, England, http://www.stainer.co.uk.
Please include any reproduction for local church use on your CCL Licence returns. All wider and any commercial use requires prior application to Stainer & Bell Ltd.
Tune: WAS LEBET, WAS SCHWEBET (or possibly THE ASH GROVE)

Written at a time when parliament was due to be prorogued.

We live in times of crime and violence, aka – We live in sharp infested waters

We live in times of crime and violence
where guns and knives would seem to rule;
incarceration offers respite,
is prison now the only school?

We learn so slowly in this era,
how we should nurture love and care.
For still we model cold derision,
with disrespect, derisive stare.

Our politicians rage and stumble,
as racists bawl across the street,
then disagreements twist and tangle,
with language coarse and indiscreet.

God give us grace and apt discretion,
the skill of choosing words that skirt
around each tempting confrontation,
give words that calm instead of hurt.

Words (including alternatives below) © 2019 Stainer & Bell Ltd, London, England, http://www.stainer.co.uk.
Please include any reproduction for local church use on your CCL Licence returns. All wider and any commercial use requires prior application to Stainer & Bell Ltd.

Tune: ST CLEMENT (Scholefield)
Metre 9.8.9.8

The original first verse of this text is as follows and can be used if wished:

We live in sharp infested waters,
the law of Cain would seem to rule,
incarceration offers respite,
is prison now the only school?

In the second stanza, first line ‘era’ can be replaced with ‘country’.

At a time when knife and gun crime are rife this text may be seen to be pertinent either as a poem or a hymn.

Our borders, our walls mock the faith that we own -Hymn/Poem

Our borders, our walls mock the faith that we own,
denying the Christ that we claim to enthrone,
for Christ is our neigbour to love or reject,
for us to disdain, or to treat with respect.

The justice of God is as real as our flesh,
as real as each life that we drown or refresh;
as active as righteousness seen in the cross,
where love met with hatred while bearing the loss.

And now, in this moment, we need to decide,
our crisis of conscience to love or deride:
to claim that some small print lets us off the hook,
or answer, with courage, Christ’s challenging look?

Andrew Pratt 14/7/2019
Words © 2019 Stainer & Bell Ltd, London, England, http://www.stainer.co.uk.
Please include any reproduction for local church use on your CCL Licence returns. All wider and any commercial use requires prior application to Stainer & Bell Ltd.
Tune: ST DEINIO

A feather of grace

After a quote drawn to my attention by John Kleinheksel –

‘Michael Gerson beautifully describes at the end of his article,
At its best, faith is the overflow of gratitude, the attempt to live as if we are loved, the fragile hope for something better on the other side of pain and death. And this feather of grace weighs more in the balance than any political gain…’

A feather of grace that puts love in the balance,
no ransom, but freedom, the smallest of gifts.
The healing of people, redemption of nations,
a singular action sealed once with a kiss.

An act of betrayal, a voice at the crossroads,
a choice of direction: to love or destroy.
Significant action, divine contradiction,
judicious inaction, was their’s to deploy.

Then Christ was abandoned, his Judas hung dying,
while Pilate is washing his hands in disgust,
for power is corrupting through pride or indifference,
while love will lie bleeding, let down in distrust.
(c) Andrew Pratt 13/6/2019
After a quote drawn to my attention by John Kleinheksel –
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/04/the-last-temptation/554066/ accessed 31/7/2019
Michael Gerson beautifully describes at the end of his article,
At its best, faith is the overflow of gratitude, the attempt to live as if we are loved, the fragile hope for something better on the other side of pain and death. And this feather of grace weighs more in the balance than any political gain.