Yes in a World of No

Sunday, 20 August 2023  | Glenn Loughrey

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A Prose Poem in Six Stanzas based on Luke 2:1-7

(with interludes from Thomas Merton)

Introduction

 

In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria. All went to their own towns to be registered. Joseph also went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to the city of David called Bethlehem, because he was descended from the house and family of David. He went to be registered with Mary, to whom he was engaged and who was expecting a child. While they were there, the time came for her to deliver her child. And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.

 

i

 

Mary,

the mother of Jesus,

A woman,

A person

Who said yes

In a world of no.

 

Who said yes

to giving life

and breath

to the Son of God,

The Prince of Peace

 

Who said yes to God

In a world of no

 

In a world of no

Peace

Freedom

Hope

 

In a world of no,

Power

Sovereignty

Voice

 

In a world of no,

Recognition

Visibility

Safety

 

In a world of no

Mary said yes,

To birthing the

Divine Yes,

Bridging the abyss

Between

The countries of

His father and

His mother

 

In a world of no,

No place for

Women

Children

The unclean

 

In a world of no,

Mary said yes.

 

(Pause)

 

(Clapsticks)

 

Interlude:

 

‘Christ our Lord did not come to bring peace to the world as a kind of spiritual tranquilizer. He brought to His Disciples a vocation and a task, to struggle in the world of violence to establish His peace not only in their own hearts but in society itself.’[1]

 

(Clapsticks)

 

(Pause)

 

ii

 

No is the world’s

Default position of fear,

Fear of the transcendent

Of mystery

Of the unlike me

Of losing privilege to the privilege-less

 

No is obsessed with

Maintaining

Power

Control

Othering

 

No is obsessed with.

Using violence in

Design

Words

Actions

 

No is obsessed with

Holding to itself

All that is

Privilege

Power

Resources

People

 

No is obsessed with

Not seeing,

Reducing others

To Persona nullius,

Not real persons.

 

(Pause)

 

(Clapsticks)

 

Interlude:

 

‘The person can never be properly understood outside the framework of social relationships and obligations……

 

(Clapsticks)

 

(Pause)

 

iii

 

No remains

Today

Now

In this present breath

 

No remains

In the lived experience

Of those subjugated by

Violence

Invasion

Extermination

Genocide

 

No remains

In our people’s lived experience

Of being

Reduced

Redacted

Redrawn

As the less than

The deficit

The excuse

 

No spoke loudly in

1770

1778

1824

1901

2007

2017

And in the unnumbered statements and

Asks from our people

ACP - After Cook and Philip.[2]

 

Of being used

As collateral in

The power game of politics,

The oppositional binary

Of yes no

Winner loser.

 

Of being

Incidental damage in an ask

Without political ideology

 

Of Seeking

Only Justice

For what should be ours,

Recognition and a voice

To be seen and included

Not as less than

But same as

Not as someone

To be fixed

But as a people who are

65,000 years

At home on country.

 

A people contemporary to all ages.

 

(Pause)

 

(Clapsticks)

 

Interlude:

 

The person finds (their) reason for existence in the realm of truth, justice, love and liberty….

 

(Clapsticks)

 

(Pause)

                    

iv

 

Mary said yes

In a world of no,

She turned fear

Into hope

Through faith and trust

 

Her not knowing,

Became the bridge

Into a new dawn

Instead of the relentless

Monotony of another sunset

Clouded with,

Disappointment

Failed promises

Infantilisation

 

Her not knowing

Soared above what she

Knew

Lived

Recalled

In

Story

Song

Dance

 

In the colonial memory of

Dispossession

displacement

Deprivation

 

Offering no

Pathway of return

To the circle of wholeness

 

The circle of

Country

Kin

Custodial belonging

 

Of

Respect

Responsibility

Reciprocity

 

(Pause)

 

(Clapsticks)

 

Interlude:

 

‘If the person is to function rationally as a member of society, (they) must meet others on the common ground of reason.’

 

(Clapsticks)

 

(Pause)

 

v

 

Mary’s yes

Can be your yes

 

The yes of accepting

The outstretched hand,

The dream of a renewed nation

Birthed in conciliation,

And truth,

Repairing the fractured nation,

As the Yes Mary bore

Repaired the relationship.

between God and creation,

 

The relationship between

The always was and always will be,

and those who

Came,

Dispersed,

Settled,

Without seeing.

 

(Pause)

 

(Clapsticks)

 

Interlude:

 

‘Common decisions and efforts must be oriented towards the common good’.[3]

 

(Clapsticks)

 

(Pause)

 

vi

 

Mary heard

The Voice of the first morning

‘Let there be….’

 

The Voice heard

Mary’s Voice

And saw that she was good

 

Into the world came

Our Voice

For the common good.

 

Can we hear echoes

Of these Voices in our time,

To say Yes, here I am ?

 

The alternative?

The Judas kiss

Thirty pieces of silver

For the souls of the first people.

 

Make Mary’s Yes

Your Yes.

 

(Clapsticks)

 

 

Glenn Loughrey is Wiradjuri man. He is a Canon of St Paul's Cathedral and the Cathedral’s Artist in Residence. Glenn is the Anglican Diocese of Melbourne's Educator and Advocate on the Referendum for Recognition and Voice, and Chair of the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Anglican Council. He is Associate Professor at the Australian National University’s College of Asia and the Pacific. You can read more about Glenn and find his artwork at https://www.glennloughrey.com/.

 

Image credits: ‘Treaty’ and ‘Turning to the Heavens and Earth’ Glenn Loughrey.

 

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