Seeking the Quiet Places
Three poets. Separated by years or perhaps an ocean that came between. But all three wondering all the time what was hiding behind the veil of this world - it is a wonder that would not let them be. They must write.
It is so intriguing that all three were vibrant, passionate and steeped in the senses when they were young. Christina was vivacious and lively and had tremendous half Italian tantrums. Emily was the clever smart, lively one in high school who had many friends who enjoyed her witty company. Her teachers talked of brilliance when speaking of her schoolwork and orations. George loved clothes and being the center of attention. Praise was dear to him. And he was a rising star at King’s college. He dreamed of honors. All three started out veritable social butterflies within their own spheres.
And then they disappeared from the social scene as suddenly and decisively as they had entered it.
Christina gradually reined in her passionate nature. She shunned parties and dressing up - she did not care a fig about being popular or being seen with important people. She began falling in love with God.
Emily grew tired of the wanna be friends of Amherst - the social climbers perhaps more enamored of her famous name in Amherst than they were simply of her friendship. Disillusionment set in. She searched for ecstasy and greatness of another kind. She did not want a wasted life. She chose solitude.
George played the game at court. He knew the right people and anxiously sought their favor. But there was always someone to compete with and he grew tired of mixing his art with popularity.
They each turned their backs on a society in which they could have easily succeeded given their gifts.
But they wanted to write poetry. And poetry demanded an atmosphere in which to dwell. Each found that atmosphere was simple, solitary, away from pretense and empty amusements.
Two of them would not even be published in their lifetimes - it was not for any lauds or laureates. It was poetry alone that drew them apart to simple places. I find that so clean and beautiful.
In that simplicity they found themselves in dialogue with the Divine which drew them on sometimes into dark frightening places where they questioned death, loneliness, sickness and pain. They cried out in rebellion sometimes at this world of woe that poets see too clearly. They did not turn back to the easy life.
Their lives are beacons in a way. For me at least. That poets must shun the superficial. They can’t live there. They are not great because they are being read at the soirées. They are great because they accepted the wages of their poetry and set their eyes away from an easy fame that flirts with mediocrity. They were each so sure of this.
There is a telling little episode in Christina’s life that brings this to the fore. Her poetry was written at home in the midst of her daily duties among her family. She was prolific. It was read and loved. It came to the eyes of an outsider and people began to read it. She was receiving praise as a rising female poet.
Robert Browning caught wind of this praise and sulked. He pretended that it was mediocre, light weight, not professional. But this was a thin disguise for simple jealousy. His wife Elizabeth Barrett Browning was being outshone. He bristled.
When good Christina heard of his displeasure she was genuinely grieved and cut to the quick. She admired his poetry and it hurt her deeply that he thought so little of her. An upstart trying to oust him from his throne. Did she question herself? Did he unnerve her? He made ME growl into my book!
She did what a loving friend would do because she DID love him. She invited him for tea and praised his own and his wife’s work profusely with perfect honesty and candor. She wanted him to see she was no competitor, but she needed to write and she could not stop. She wanted only his love and encouragement.
He took the tea. But he always remained suspicious of her. Fame had twisted his heart away from her poetry which he might have loved but for his craving for laurels. And she was left wounded by someone who might have been a friend. A poet misplaced, was Browning.
Any artist and writer knows these struggles. Seeking to be published for fame or simply seeking a quiet place to bring forth beauty? Why do we write? It’s a hard question to answer simply. But these three poets give me pause and answer me with their lives. We write, we paint, we compose because we must and we need to seek the best atmosphere in which to do it even if it means leaving fame and a glitzy social scene full of power people behind. And we must grow sure of our art when encountering nay sayers.
It is the only way to enter the great conversation with the Divine which in the end is what poets are after. In simplicity and undistracted solitude of heart they take their journey.