Some keep the Sabbath going to Church – I keep it, staying at Home – With a Bobolink for a Chorister – And an Orchard, for a Dome –
Some keep the Sabbath in Surplice – I, just wear my Wings – And instead of tolling the Bell, for Church, Our little Sexton – sings.
God preaches, a noted Clergyman – And the sermon is never long, So instead of getting to Heaven, at last – I’m going, all along.
~ Emily Dickinson (The Poems of Emily Dickinson, #236)
“Home, Sweet Home” by Lizbeth Bullock Humphrey
Save your sermons for someone that’s afraid to love If you knew what I feel then you couldn’t be so sure I’ll be right here lying in the hands of God If you feel angels in your head Teardrop of joy runs down your face You will rise ~ Dave Matthews ♫ (Lying in the Hands of God) ♫
I am not interested in a spirituality that cannot encompass my humanness. I find little comfort or guidance in traditional dogma or unqualified New Age optimism. Because beneath the small daily trials are harder paradoxes, things the mind cannot reconcile but the heart must hold if we are to live fully: profound tiredness and radical hope; shattered beliefs and relentless faith; the seemingly contradictory longings for personal freedom and a deep commitment to others, for solitude and intimacy, for the ability to simply be with the world and the need to change what we know is not right about how we are living. ~ Oriah Mountain Dreamer (The Invitation)
Tim was on call last night so I didn’t think we’d be going anywhere today, but he wasn’t called too often and he got enough sleep, so we took a little trip to Madison, which is a 45-minute drive from here. I badly wanted to see Jane Eyre and the only place it is showing around here is the Madison Art Cinema.
4.9.11 ~ Madison, Connecticut
We stopped at When Pigs Fly for brunch and then braved I-95 southbound to reach our destination. We usually wait for movies to become available on Netflix, but we were told the cinematography was amazing in this one, so off we went and I was not disappointed.
After the movie we strolled around the center of town and photographed some of the sculptures. The weather was lovely so we got some ice cream, sat in the car, and watched a squirrel busily foraging for food as we enjoyed our treat. We discussed the various versions of the film we have seen.
Fortunately for me I had read Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë, and all her other books, long before seeing any of the film versions. The story is so long it is difficult to tell in the space of a two-hour movie. For this 2011 version, directed by Cary Fukunaga, I felt the most important parts of the story were included and I actually liked the way it was told with flashbacks.
My favorite production is the 1983 BBC television mini-series of Jane Eyre. I bought it on two video tapes and wore them out just in time to replace them with the new DVD. It follows most of the book and was great to watch in the winter when I had four hours to curl up with a cup of tea and a blanket…
When I went to see the 1996 version, directed by Franco Zeffirelli, I remember being disappointed because it didn’t cover all that I thought it should. But that was about fifteen years ago so perhaps I should give it a fresh try.
The 1944 version with Orson Welles was terrible, in my humble opinion. I found Welles’ portrayal of Rochester about as frightening as it gets. It was like a melodramatic horror movie and not a deep and moving love story. But then I’m highly sensitive and I’m sure there are others who didn’t feel as repulsed as I did.
But I think all the versions I’ve seen have had the heartfelt words that Jane Eyre uttered to Edward Rochester, which sum up what I feel is the main message of the story:
Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain, and little, I am soulless and heartless? You think wrong! I have as much soul as you, and full as much heart! … I am not talking to you now through the medium of custom, conventionalities, nor even of mortal flesh; it is my spirit that addresses your spirit; just as if both had passed through the grave, and we stood at God’s feet, equal – as we are! … I am no bird; and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being, with an independent will; which I now exert to leave you. ~ Charlotte Brontë (Jane Eyre)
To be released in October – a graphic novel, Jane, by April Lindner.
No man has the right to dictate what other men should perceive, create or produce, but all should be encouraged to reveal themselves, their perceptions and emotions, and to build confidence in the creative spirit. ~ Ansel Adams (Screenwriting with a Conscience: Ethics for Screenwriters)
So there will be no guiding light for you and me We are not sailors lost out on the sea We were always headed toward eternity Hoping for a glimpse of Galilee ~ Emmylou Harris ♫ (The Pearl) ♫
And I can tell by the way you’re searching For something you can’t even name That you haven’t been able to come to the table Simply glad that you came And when you feel like this try to imagine That we’re all like frail boats on the sea Just scanning the night for that great guiding light Announcing the Jubilee ~ Mary Chapin Carpenter ♫ (Jubilee) ♫
“Sailboats in Pourville” by Anna Bilińska-Bohdanowicz
Adrift! A little boat adrift! And night is coming down! Will no one guide a little boat Unto the nearest town?
So sailors say — on yesterday — Just as the dusk was brown One little boat gave up its strife And gurgled down and down
So angels say — on yesterday — Just as the dawn was red One little boat — o’erspent with gales — Retrimmed its masts — redecked its sails — And shot — exultant on!
~ Emily Dickinson (The Poems of Emily Dickinson, #6)
Now that I have a Kindle and can read for hours on end without bothering my eyes, I have delved into a huge comprehensive biography of the life of Emily Dickinson, My Wars Are Laid Away in Books: The Life of Emily Dickinson. The above poem struck a chord with me.
What I’ve been learning is that Emily grappled with an exhausting spiritual struggle during her childhood and young adulthood. One by one more and more of her family members and friends experienced evangelical conversions each time a revival made its way to her mother’s church in Amherst, Massachusetts. Emily was never moved to convert, winding up a solitary holdout, and I suspect it was the hypocrisy and inconsistencies in the dogma as presented by her teachers and ministers that never sat well with her.
Some keep the Sabbath going to Church — I keep it, staying at Home — With a Bobolink for a Chorister — And an Orchard, for a Dome — ~ Emily Dickinson (The Poems of Emily Dickinson, #236)
Emily found spiritual fulfillment and ecstasy in nature. I think it can be found in the creative arts, too, and in healing. I will read on, as I just got to the “Adrift!” poem yesterday, but my feeling is that once she made peace with this realization, she was able re-trim her masts, re-deck her sails, and get on with her true vocation, her poetry, her spiritual expression, her own way of worshiping.
As a child my intuition rebelled against my father’s atheism. The first chance I got I latched on to a religion with just as much oppressive dogmatism as the scientific atheism from which I was trying to escape. But while ‘gurgling down’ in my spiritual struggle, it slowly dawned on me that religion and science are simply different ways of trying to make sense of and explain the world and the universe. The assumptions of both can be terribly flawed and misguided. Organized religion and organized science can both be dogmatic and self-righteous. People who worship science, in my opinion, give up their own experience of the divine to the men in lab coats, our modern-day priests. Ideally there is a balance between Logic and Wonder, however.
When I started reading Emerson and Dickinson I found myself home at last with the ideas of transcendentalists:
The transcendentalists felt the presence of God in their intuition, but they advised that intuition should be guided by reason, and not follow its own course unaided. They discerned that God speaks directly to the self within us. They stressed the value and importance of personal mystical experience over beliefs, doctrines, rituals, and institutions. All their insights derived from their inner life. Their movement was a reaffirmation of the inner way of introversion or interiority. ~ Wayne Teasdale (The Mystic Heart: Discovering a Universal Spirituality in the World’s Religions)
How I admire Emily for holding on to her inner life!
“View of the Old Augustinian Monastery in Pappenheim” by Karl Raupp
You can call it nostalgia, I don’t mind Standing on that windswept hillside Listening to the church bells chime… In that magic time… ~ Van Morrison ♫ (Magic Time) ♫
Sometimes you get there in spite of the route Losing track of your life and what it’s about The road seems to know when to straighten right out… I could wonder if all of it led me to you I could show you the arrows and circles I drew I didn’t have a map, it’s the best I could do On the fly and on the run ~ Mary Chapin Carpenter ♫ (Elysium) ♫
I don’t want to sound too cosmic or anything… but I think that music is a spiritual experience. … Music is true. An octave is a mathematical reality. So is a 5th. So is a major 7th cord. And I have the feeling that these have emotional meanings to us, not only because we’re taught that a major 7th is warm and fuzzy and a diminished is sort of threatening and dark, but also because they actually do have these meanings. It’s almost like it’s a language that’s not a matter of our choosing. It’s a truth. The laws of physics apply to music, and music follows that. So it really lifts us out of this subjective, opinionated human position and drops us into the cosmic picture just like that. ~ James Taylor (Performing Songwriter, May 2002)
