May Magnificat

*** Revised Common Lectionary *** Lectionary Reading: Luke 1:46b-55 CLASSIC POEM: May Magnificat Gerard Manley Hopkins May is Mary’s month, and I Muse at that and wonder why : Her feasts follow reason, Dated due to season— Candlemas, Lady Day ; But the Lady Month, May, Why fasten that upon her, With a feasting in her honour ? Is it only its being brighter Than the most are must delight her ? Is it opportunist And flowers finds soonest ? Ask of her, the mighty mother : Her reply puts this other Question : What is Spring?— Growth in every thing— Flesh and fleece, fur and feather, Grass and greenworld all together ; Star-eyed strawberry-breasted Throstle above her nested Cluster of bugle blue eggs thin Forms and warms the life within ; And bird and blossom swell In sod or sheath or shell. All things rising, all things sizing Mary sees, sympathizing With that world of good Nature’s motherhood. Their magnifying of each its kind With delight calls to mind How she did in her stored Magnify the Lord. Well but there was more than this : Spring’s universal bliss Much, had much to say To offering Mary May. When drop-of-blood-and-foam-dapple Bloom lights the orchard-apple And thicket and thorp are merry With silver-surfèd cherry And azuring-over greybell makes Wood banks and brakes wash wet like lakes And magic cuckoocall Caps, clears, and clinches all— This ecstasy all through mothering earth Tells Mary her mirth till Christ’s birth To remember and exultation In God who was her salvation. *** This poem is in the public domain, and may be read in a live-streamed worship service. CONTEMPORARY POEM: Magnificat Eleanor Wilner SNIPPET: When he had suckled there, he began to grow: first, he was an infant in her arms, but soon, drinking and drinking at the sweet milk she could not keep from filling her, … [ READ THE FULL POEM ]