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Beauty is not pasted over suffering but grows out of it—like the proverbial shoot from parched ground. Bruce Herman

The Uncompleted Man

The Uncompleted Man

I saw an uncompleted man

a wanderer in delicious orchards, alone

awaiting wholeness and heaven

perhaps a woman to make him whole

 

gladdened celebrations were held on high

when an uncompleted woman came

and bells to tunes of fullness sang

for a journey begun again

 

a fabulous journey was their roaming

for uncompleted life held sway

over sweet inaudible murmurings

of darkness swamped by light of day

 

the friendship missing pieces helped to find

and made a lovely level whole, by and by,

while the shy and friendly darkness

went along for the ride and the love

 

so it’s to the darkness that he turns,

the nonetheless uncompleted man,

when his dreams of buried gold unfold

into life, the darkness he asks again…

 

…timidly again about wholeness and heaven

fullness, emptiness, completeness, and gold

and darkness tells him that only a small child

could understand

make the male and the female one, she says

let the male not be male, and the female

not female—for then you will not look outside

for completeness

 

so he-she looks the darkness in the eye,

like a diner ready for the main course

**

Tony Macelli, poem and image.

From: The Void That Shines. Where words don’t reach. 2022

This book is available in 3 editions on Amazon. Each poem is illustrated with a painting or graphic. It is also accompanied by a series of quotations by other authors on the same theme as the poem. Organised along a spiritual journey, here are over 60 new poems, 60 new colour illustrations, and 60 collections of quotations. Enjoy the verse, the visuals, and the quotes on your own journey!


More:

- January 2024: Wendell Berry and Carol Aust
- November 2023: Luci Shaw & Botticelli
- March 2023: Jill Baumgaertner & Liviu Mocan
- March 2022: Annukka Laine
- January 2022: Megan Fisher
- November 2021: Luci Shaw & Worku Goshu
- September 2021: Pádraig Ó Tuama & Leo G. Franchi
- May 2021: Malcolm Guite & Unknown
- January 2021: Emily Dickinson & Henri Matisse
- December 2020: Allan Boesak & Harm Visser
- June 2020: Luci Shaw & Sebastian Wien
- November 2019: Dennis O’Driscoll & David Robinson
- June 2019: C.S. Lewis & Wayne Adams
- May 2019: Malcolm Guite & Andrea Mantegna: Ascension
- May 2019: Denise Levertov & Ernst Barlach
- October 2018: Sándor Reményik & Ildikó Mecséri
- August 2018: Abigail Carroll & Caravaggio
- May 2018: Bohuslav Reynek: Poet and Visual Artist
- March 2018: George MacDonald & James Ensor
- January 2018: Wendell Berry & Annukka Laine
- November 2017: Mary Oliver & Pauline Baynes
- August 2017: Ellyn Maybe & Pablo Picasso
- April 2017: Lucy Shaw & Henry Ossawa Tanner
- April 2017: Denise Levertov & Diego Velazquez
- February 2017: David L. Hatton & David L. Hatton
- November 2016: Dennis ODriscoll & David Robinson
- June 2016: Luci Shaw & Marietha Smit
- April 2016: Robert Browning & Pauline Baynes
- March 2016: Wendell Berry & Carol Aust
- January 2016: Dante G. Rossetti & Dante G. Rossetti
- December 2015: Sufjan Stevens & Geertgen tot Sint Jans
- September 2015: Thomas Merton & Andre Racz
- June 2015: Frances Bellerby & Jeltje Hoogenkamp
- March 2015: Christine Perrin & Ted Prescott
- January 2015: Jan Krist & Gor Chahal
- December 2014: Sufjan Stevens & Geertgen tot Sint Jans
- November 2014: David L. Hatton & David L. Hatton
- July 2014: Chris Lorensson & Dylan Clements
- June 2014: Jonathan Evens & Henry Shelton
- April 2014: Gerlind Krause & Worku Goshu
- April 2014: Christine Perrin & Michelangelo
- February 2014: David Hatton & Angelo da Fonseca
- January 2014: James Weldon Johnson & Aaron Douglas
- January 2014: Hannah Main-van der Kamp & Liviu Mocan
- December 2013: Christine Perrin & Fra Angelico
- December 2013: Luci Shaw & Botticelli
- November 2013: Christine Perrin & Luca Signorelli
- October 2013: Hannah Main-van der Kamp & Tanja Butler
- October 2013: James Weldon Johnson & Aaron Douglas
- October 2013: Marilyn Chandler McEntyre & Johannes Vermeer
- September 2013: The Renewal of Ekphrasis by John Skillen