Psalm of Attention (II)

or Psalm of the Wounded Imagination • Lines from the Doxology Conference

What follows is the second set of lines from the Doxology Conference, written as a psalm. You can read the first set in my previous post.

As I mentioned there, during the sessions I practiced something I often do when I’m trying to pay attention: I listened, wrote down phrases that caught light, and later gathered them into a free verse poem. It’s a simple way of holding the words that pass through a room. Not analyzing them, just receiving them.

This isn’t a summary of the second day, but a record of listening.

Antiphon:
Lifted and scarred, you make room for us, O Christ;
in your wounding, the world is made whole.

⸻

Jesus ascends.
Makes room for us,
for our healing,
for our claiming the gift of the Spirit.

He rises, not to depart, but to draw near;
not to escape us, but to enfold us.

He still bears the stigmata.
Saints are his coheirs and coregents,
because they are
his co-conspirators,
and his co-sufferers.
United with him in life and death.

The wounds remain as welcome.
The scars shine like open doors.

Knowledge of the Father
can only come through
the wounded human
body of the Son.

In the flesh, God is known;
in the broken, God is revealed.

Communion is the present tense
of Calvary.
He rules not
by the iron of force,
but the wood of shame.

We come not to conquer but to consent,
not to prevail but to be held.

Here is the actual marriage vow,
the sacrament of perfect love.
Tearful,
tender,
intercession.

Heaven bends low;
earth breathes yes.

Good art helps us express
our hopes,
but it also shapes us
into the very thing we
hope for.

Imagination is the integration
of all our faculties
attentive toward the world.

Form us, O Christ, into what we behold;
teach us to imagine as you imagine.

God is not vengeful.
God is vindicating.
God is not jealous.
God is passionate.

⸻

Final Antiphon:
Lifted and scarred, you make room for us, O Christ;
in your wounding, the world is made whole.