{"id":3089,"date":"2019-09-18T00:00:41","date_gmt":"2019-09-18T04:00:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/mission-and-identity\/?p=3089"},"modified":"2019-09-18T16:42:58","modified_gmt":"2019-09-18T20:42:58","slug":"night-skies-a-long-ago-healing-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/2019\/09\/18\/night-skies-a-long-ago-healing-time\/","title":{"rendered":"Night skies, a long ago healing time"},"content":{"rendered":"

Wednesday, September 18<\/p>\n

Thomas Cenatolla caught my attention today, during a morning awash in memories from 1968 and 1969 when I spent two summers living on the Pine Ridge Lakota Reservation. Carmel and Serena Two Elk, two sisters now in their sixties – – reminded me of when they were children during a second summer living in the Tios\u2019paye of Luke and Rose Weasel Bear deep in The Rez. They all knew that some hard inner attention was eating at my spirit all that summer. It showed each night when it got dark when our kerosene lamps no longer offered light to read by, I walked c. a quarter mile away from our camp and up a hill that framed our horizon. I stood there on top of the hill into the dark sky, for perhaps an hour each night. I remember those darkening night skies as the gradual healing of a deep, year-long depression that would end some weeks later with the death of Steve Tobacco (Wanblee Ska – \u201cWhite Eagle\u201d).<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

This morning when Carmel and Serena told me their memories of those long nights, I took this picture of that hill; it happened that a soft rain storm came to rest where I used to stand.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

These long memories remind me that \u201csabbatical\u201d comes from \u201cSabbath\u201d which for several thousand years has meant \u201ca sacred time when stillness welcomes strategic planning while also revealing the sacred heart of human presence in the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Best to read the poem out loud, with pauses.<\/p>\n

Have a blessed mid-week,<\/p>\n

john sj<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Sacred Hill \u2013 Oglala, South Dakota \u2013 September 17, 2019<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cIn the Evening We Shall Be Examined on Love\u201d<\/strong>
\nBY THOMAS CENTOLELLA<\/a>
\n\u2014St. John of the Cross<\/em><\/p>\n

And it won\u2019t be multiple choice,
\nthough some of us would prefer it that way.
\nNeither will it be essay, which tempts us to run on
\nwhen we should be sticking to the point, if not together.
\nIn the evening there shall be implications
\nour fear will change to complications. No cheating,
\nwe\u2019ll be told, and we\u2019ll try to figure the cost of being true
\nto ourselves. In the evening when the sky has turned
\nthat certain blue, blue of exam books, blue of no more
\ndaily evasions, we shall climb the hill as the light empties
\nand park our tired bodies on a bench above the city
\nand try to fill in the blanks. And we won\u2019t be tested
\nlike defendants on trial, cross-examined
\ntill one of us breaks down, guilty as charged. No,
\nin the evening, after the day has refused to testify,
\nwe shall be examined on love like students
\nwho don\u2019t even recall signing up for the course
\nand now must take their orals, forced to speak for once
\nfrom the heart and not off the top of their heads.
\nAnd when the evening is over and it\u2019s late,
\nthe student body asleep, even the great teachers
\nretired for the night, we shall stay up
\nand run back over the questions, each in our own way:
\nwhat\u2019s true, what\u2019s false, what unknown quantity
\nwill balance the equation, what it would mean years from now
\nto look back and know
\nwe did not fail.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Wednesday, September 18 Thomas Cenatolla caught my attention today, during a morning awash in memories from 1968 and 1969 when I spent two summers living on the Pine Ridge Lakota Reservation. Carmel and Serena Two Elk, two sisters now in … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":139,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[11641],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3089"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/139"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3089"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3089\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3092,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3089\/revisions\/3092"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3089"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3089"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3089"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}