Posted by Tyler Kirkpatrick | June 29, 2020
I was recently inspired to write a poem for each day of creation–(which are written as poems themselves). I will be posting a new entry each day. Up first: Genesis 1:1-5.
The First Day
“God is not darkness, but in the darkness I saw God.”[1]
The work of God begins in darkness evening first, then morning. While I slumber in subconsciousness God works well before my waking knitting neurons and leading them on right paths “Our life is a faint tracing on the surface of mystery”[2] Unexplained abyss formless and void.
GPS pinpoints the coordinates of our routine transpacific flight But neither person nor computer Knows the world that lies below the surface of the deep over which we hover
Ferries filled to capacity jet confidently and routinely across Puget Sound, barely submerged into the unseen darkness below They are water-winged children Dog-paddling on the surface of mystery
God is light …though the darkness hide thee. The work of God begins hovering over the darkness of a world still uncreated. In the unexplained abyss of formless chaos God calls forth light evening first, then the illumination of morning. The first day.
[1] Something I read years ago and a quote I’ve been able to track down. Rainer Maria Rilke, perhaps?
[2] Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek.
[3] Featured image: Watkins, Carleton E., 1829-1916. Solar Eclipse from Mount Santa Lucia, from Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN. http://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=56320 [retrieved June 29, 2020]. Original source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Carleton_Watkins_(American_-_Solar_Eclipse_from_Mount_Santa_Lucia_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg.