UNEXPECTED: THE WOMEN OF ADVENT
An Art & Prayer Experience
Week One - Tamar
FALLEN (Tamar’s Query)
Poem by Michelle Jones
FALLEN by Michelle Jones
“If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?” –George Berkeley
“If a woman falls, and everyone is around to see it, but no one cares, does she make a sound?” –Tamar
I fell
as tears from Judah’s eyes
I ran
until
anger wiped me
from his face
Daughter swiped
from daughter’s place.
If a woman falls
because
Life turned off the lights
pushed her from behind
shoved her in the side
stripped her
then tripped her
without a
heads up
about the down stairs…
Does she just wait
for Bottom
to shatter the bones of her
hoping the groans of her
reach somebody.
Anybody?
I fell
naked, flailing
wailing soaked up by Deaf Dark
gravity rushing me to my grave
Cold dirt hungry
for warm flesh
I fell
past the coulda-done-something eyes
the shoulda-done-something lies
Humans unseeing
unravel my being
until
the spectacle gives way
to boredom first
and then contempt
unholy affront
unmeant
for hearts pristine
or hands too clean.
Unchaste bride
wed to the whims of evil men
who hold me down
then call me loose
who use me
until
I am a wilderness
a land wasted and forgotten
because
They refuse to remember
I once was beautiful.
So
Bottom seeks to claim me
and rename me
“She is mine,” he says
“She is Fallen.”
But…
If a woman falls and everyone is around to see it, but no one cares, who then is truly
“fallen”?
Week Two - Rahab
Rahab by Lin Noonen
Dear Rahab,
was any desperation yearning the weave that held you in the window between millennia ago and centuries to come
the same scarlet Kermes splri
as arms wide cross hung
how weightless did your hands feel
to release red reeling into faith
into unearned culmination of grace
and that first breath, the world
as you knew it
crumbling
was the cord hug just as much over
the ledge of your heart, saved
could you have imagined that this thread would everlastingly stretch across time
that i would hold the other end of it
Poem by Lin Noonen
Week Three - Ruth
There are very few mentions of God in the book of Ruth, but He is active in and through the lives of the people in the narrative, especially our Moabitess heroine. Likewise, the artists who created the work have made it 100% immersive. Go to the Imago Prayer Space to experience it. If you would like to go during hours other than scheduled times, please contact Michelle Jones at mj@idcpdx.com to make an appointment.
