What Is Not Written

(from Homily 2 of Saint Isaak's _Ascetical Homilies_)

Once more, I’d like to share some results of a project that has been central to my days of late. My working title is Heart’s Ladder, and these texts are verse adaptations of selections from the Ascetical Homilies of our beloved Saint Isaak the Syrian. His feast day comes near the end of this month (January 28), so I expect to share many of these adaptations over the coming weeks.

Scripture has not laid out for us

what lies in the age to come.

Still, scripture does suggest

how we might glimpse—

without a change in our nature, nor

translation to another place—

something of the delight awaiting us.

With figures and sweet analogies—such

as stir an ache of yearning—

scripture assures us of a goodness

and a life incomprehensible,

of which no similar goodness

is apparent here or now.

What are we to make of that?

For now, we must only see

that spiritual delight is not found

to exist substantially outside

the souls of those who receive it.

And know this: as a true part of the whole,

such delight proves to be—and will prove to be—

the noetic operation of the Holy Spirit.