Category: music

Poets struggle, sculptors risk…

One gospel (Mark) doesn’t mention the birth of Jesus. The other three relate it in different ways. This has led me to reflect on the way in which different arts attempt to give expression to the nature of God. 

Poets struggle with the language, 
words both mystic and absurd 
fail to frame the incarnation, 
giving flesh to living Word.

Art constrained by expectation 
will not let the colours go, 
only spreading, mixing media 
emulate the Spirit’s flow.

Sculptors sometimes risk the fracture, 
letting stone dictate the form, 
giving rise to new creation 
chance God shattering our norm.

Even music caged in bar lines 
lacks the freedom to expand,
till in jazz, through improvising, 
rhythms stretch to new demands.

Nothing ever fixed or final, 
way beyond the human mind:
mystery and imagination…
all that we will ever find…
© Andrew Pratt Written 17/12/2022

             Incarnation – Watercolour © Andrew E. Pratt

On the sidewalk – a song of poverty and loneliness

I am posting this midway through Christian Aid Week. We tend to focus on needs which are abroad. Often there are people on our doorstep, in villages, towns and cities where we live who have needs which are profound. Perhaps this is where we will meet Christ. This song was written form the perspective of such a person. Hal Hopson set it with a tune for America. Some years later a (now retired) Methodist Presbyter set it and recorded it and it was published in his book, Reach.

1	On the sidewalk, by the shop-front 
        [On the pavement, by the shop-front - alt line]
	I laid down my mat to sleep;
	tears of sadness welled within me,
	thoughts of all that might have been.

2	Lost within this hidden city
	where the subway hums and groans,
	left unnoticed and defenceless,
	God forsaken and alone.

3	Can you sense my thrumming heart-beat,
	can you feel a reason why
	in your wealth you're just as lonely,
	waiting for your time to die?

4	Maybe I should look more clearly
	through the eyes of given hope,
	maybe you could stoop more lowly
	that together we may cope.

Andrew E Pratt; Words © 2002 Stainer & Bell Ltd, London, England copyright@stainer.co.uk. 
Please include any reproduction for local church use on your CCL Licence returns. 
All wider and any commercial use requires prior application to Stainer & Bell Ltd.
Metre: 8 7 8 7 Trochaic
Tunes: RECONCILIATION (Hopson) published in Whatever Name or Creed, 2002.
SIDEWALK (Sharrocks) © 2010 Stainer & Bell Ltd, London, England copyright@stainer.co.uk  
published in Reach with accompanying CD.
A recording from the CD can be found here.

Hymn Books – all new on sale.

All of my own collections are currently on sale at half price together with others such as writers as Elizabeth Cosnett, Marjorie Dobson, Alan Gaunt, Fred Pratt Green, Fred Kaan, Janet Wootton, Brian Wren and of course Sydney Carter – click here for details