First Things RSS Feed - John Whitworth https://www.firstthings.com/author/john-whitworth en-us Copyright 2025 First Things. All Rights Reserved. ft@firstthings.com (The Editors) ft@firstthings.com (The Editors) Mon, 20 Jan 2025 16:51:41 -0500 https://d2201k5v4hmrsv.cloudfront.net/img/favicon-196.png First Things RSS Feed Image https://www.firstthings.com/rss/author/john-whitworth 60 Going Out https://www.firstthings.com/article/2017/11/going-out https://www.firstthings.com/article/2017/11/going-out Wed, 01 Nov 2017 00:00:00 -0400 I was nervous as a child though now I’m not.
I used to dream. I used to dream a lot.
I don’t dream now. My dreaming days are done.

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]]> ​The Brethren https://www.firstthings.com/article/2017/03/the-brethren https://www.firstthings.com/article/2017/03/the-brethren Wed, 01 Mar 2017 00:00:00 -0500 The brethren walk about in hats
And up they go and down they go.
The brethren’s hats are black as bats,
Their faces are as white as snow,
And up they go and down they go.

Amen amen they say and then
They turn their faces to the wall.
As if they were not there at all
They turn their faces to the wall.
They are the most peculiar men.

They gather by the sounding seas
And talk with their peculiar god,
A permanently awkward squad
United in their miseries
In chapels by the sounding seas.

Like furtive, liquorless shebeens
Or misbegotten soup tureens,
The chapels stand, as hard as nails,
Against the equinoctial gales,
Can this be what religion means?

Yes, this is what religion means.

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]]> God Talk https://www.firstthings.com/article/2016/12/god-talk https://www.firstthings.com/article/2016/12/god-talk Thu, 01 Dec 2016 00:00:00 -0500 Evenings are when I like to talk to God.
I wait all day to watch till He goes by.
I wonder is it me and am I odd?
I see the sky and God is in the sky.

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]]> The Power of Love https://www.firstthings.com/article/2016/01/the-power-of-love https://www.firstthings.com/article/2016/01/the-power-of-love Fri, 01 Jan 2016 00:00:00 -0500 When I go walking on the street
My Guardian Angel walks behind.
I hear the rustling of his feet.
I feel the movement of his mind.
His heart is mine. I hear it beat.
My heart is his and he is kind.

I hear the rustling of his feet.
I feel the whirring of his wings.
Be still my soul, my body sings,
Be still, attentive and discreet.
The Love of God is very near,
That sees into the heart of things.

My heart is his. His heart is mine.
We pray for Grace to flow like wine,
The Grace that knows and understands,
Implicit in the touch of hands,
Where Principalities and Powers
Combine to bless our golden hours.

My heart is his. His heart is mine.
Two hammering hearts, four feet, six wings.
Our intercessions are divine.
My soul be still, be still and know.
Our stillness is the port of kings.
Mark as we go. Mark as we go.

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]]> The Power of Love https://www.firstthings.com/article/2015/05/the-power-of-love https://www.firstthings.com/article/2015/05/the-power-of-love Fri, 01 May 2015 00:00:00 -0400 When I go walking on the street
My Guardian Angel walks behind.
I hear the rustling of his feet.
I feel the movement of his mind.
His heart is mine. I hear it beat.
My heart is his and he is kind.

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]]> The Scapegoat https://www.firstthings.com/article/2015/04/the-scapegoat https://www.firstthings.com/article/2015/04/the-scapegoat Wed, 01 Apr 2015 00:00:00 -0400 Your Dad is bad, your Mum is mad,
Your brothers all run wild,
And you were born with feet of horn,
For you are Satan’s child.

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]]> Dead Souls https://www.firstthings.com/article/2014/11/dead-souls https://www.firstthings.com/article/2014/11/dead-souls Sat, 01 Nov 2014 00:00:00 -0400 The dead lie in their linen, white as chalk,
Their noses, lips and eyes are sewn tight shut,
But they can look about them well enough.
And smell, and breathe, and, Lord, how they can talk.

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]]> Sleepers https://www.firstthings.com/article/2014/02/sleepers https://www.firstthings.com/article/2014/02/sleepers Sat, 01 Feb 2014 00:00:00 -0500 Where are the Gods that used to walk the Weald,
Where are their golden limbs and fiery faces,
Divinities of river, tree and field,
The uncommon spirits of the common places?
Where are the gaudy Goddesses of Heaven?
Where are the old immortal sisterhood,
True, talismanic three, or nine, or seven,
Arch-arbiters of evil and of good?
They are dead, you say. Stone dead, you say again.
This wonderful, wide world belongs to men,
And men alone. Show me the bodies then?
I say they sleep. I say they sleep up there,
Inviolate and secret, free from care
For ever, in a better, purer air.

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]]> Primavera https://www.firstthings.com/article/2013/04/primavera https://www.firstthings.com/article/2013/04/primavera Mon, 01 Apr 2013 00:00:00 -0400 It is Spring and the young
Are all falling in love.
It is Spring and the tongue
Of the poet is free.
Now Winter is shut
Like a snake in a box
With the shriek of the owl
And the yelp of the fox.
Now Winter withdraws
To his palace of bones,
With a clanging of doors
And a grinding of stones.
And Spring is the kiss
That awakes us again,
In the softness of leaves
And the promise of rain.
So I sing like a bird
At the top of the tree,
The book of the word
And the turn of the key.
I sing like a bird
In the womb of the wood,
The flight of the dark
And the triumph of good.
I sing like a bird,
As the tongue finds its groove
The book of the word
And the power of love.

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]]> Changelings https://www.firstthings.com/article/2012/11/changelings https://www.firstthings.com/article/2012/11/changelings Thu, 01 Nov 2012 00:00:00 -0400 Listen, your changeling children are swinging like monkeys,
Hand-over-hand through the leaves of the trees of the forest,
Hugging and kissing and swinging and laughing and singing
Wishes like wings as they flutter and float to the ground.

Feral and faery and wary, the wraiths of your children,
Glister and glisten high up in the skittering sunshine,
Fashioning songs in the swish of the teetering treetops,
Listen, O listen, the weald is awash with the sound.

Songs of the gods of the gongs in the words of the wicked,
Songs of the wrongs of the crocodile spawn of the devil,
Songs that are born in the terrible teeth of the butcher,
Listen, the music goes round and around and around.

Light-bringing Lucifer burns in the eyes of your children,
Satan the Star of the Morning embraces your children,
Darkness has stolen the flesh of your flesh, and your children,
Lost in the fell of the forest, will never be found.

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