Tag Archives: Henry Vaughan

They Are All Gone into the World of Light

By Robin Bates | Published: May 13, 2012

In “Ascension Hymn,” Henry Vaughan laments that he can catch only glimpses of God’s glory.

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Will Supreme Court Slay Robin Hood?

By Robin Bates | Published: April 4, 2012

If Obamacare’s mandate is overturned, the moneyed interests will have won. In Giebenhain’s poem, the sheriff will have bested Robin Hood.

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Each Enclosed Spirit Is a Singing Bird

By Robin Bates | Published: May 29, 2011

I awoke this beautiful spring morning to hear the birds at full throttle, giving me an excuse to post a wonderful bird poem by Henry Vaughan, the 17th century metaphysical poet.

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Searching for a Light in Death’s Cave

By Robin Bates | Published: January 16, 2011

Spiritual Sunday Today’s post I dedicate to those who lost loved ones in the Arizona shootings—and to everyone else who has lost someone close in the past year or so. I offer up a poem by the 17th century poetry Henry Vaughan that gets at some of the mood swings that the mourners can expect […]

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God Calls to Us in the Night

By Robin Bates | Published: December 5, 2010

Spiritual Sunday My basketball player who is writing an essay about Henry Vaughan (see my post on him and the poem “Cock Crowing” here) has me thinking about light and dark imagery in the poetry of this 17th century mystical Anglican. Usually Vaughan associates God with light, as in “Cock Crowing” and “The World” (which […]

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Cock Crowing: Greeting God’s Holy Light

By Robin Bates | Published: November 21, 2010

Joan Miro, “Le Coq” Spiritual Sunday This is the story of a student basketball player whose life has been changed by the mystic religious poetry of Henry Vaughan. Okay, so “changed” might be an exaggeration. But the 17th century metaphysical poet is helping Brian sort through a series of life reversals in ways that I […]

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A Spiritual Interpretation of Waterfalls

By Robin Bates | Published: June 20, 2010

Spiritual Sunday I still haven’t gotten over the waterfalls at Yosemite—does one ever?—and so am sharing a spiritual interpretation of a waterfall by the 17th century mystical Anglican poet Henry Vaughan.  I’ve mentioned in a previous post  that I have mixed feelings about Vaughan (especially by how he sees the natural world cordoned off from […]

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I Saw Eternity the Other Night

By Robin Bates | Published: May 16, 2010

Spiritual Sunday As a liberal Episcopalian, I have always maintained, almost as an unquestioned tenet of faith, that there are many roads to the top of the mountain and that no one religion has an exclusive highway to God.  Therefore I found myself challenged by an article in The Boston Globe (a tip to Andrew Sullivan’s Daily Dish for alerting […]

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