Poem August 11, 1986 Issue

I hear a deeper strain

SUSANNAH BREAUX SEAMAN

It was long
I sang the song
of my fathers.

(Thirty and eight years for me too, perhaps.)^{See John 5:2–9 .}
I sang it
unwillingly,

Longing to rise up,
to shed that tuneless chant
like the man at Bethesda:
Not needing crutch or current
but rising on command
to a higher song.

But how to break a bond
forged and reforged
by generations of crippled thinking?
How to reach an ear
deafened by harsh clamorings
of unchecked matter?
What was the song?

Yearning,
I reached deeper—
past yesterday,
beyond the boundaries of sense
into now.

And then I heard it—
unchanged by centuries
of tuneless chants,
the same sweet strains
that rocked his being (and all being):
The symphony of my Father.

And I rose
to sing
that "new song."^{Rev. 14:3.}

SUSANNAH BREAUX SEAMAN

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