My Sour-Sweet Days (eBook, EPUB)

Mark Oakley reveals George Herbert as a fine companion with whom to examine the journey of the soul.His poems are 'heart-work and heaven-work', embracing love and closeness, anger and despair, reconciliation and hope.There is too an appealing and audacious playfulness about Herbert: he seems to take God on, knowing God will win, confident God will not abandon him.This sense of relationship with God as primarily friendship is one of many intriguing and healing aspects we are invited to consider.George Herbert is one of the great 17th century poet-priests. His poems embrace every shade of the spiritual life, from love and closeness, to anger and despair, to reconciliation and hope. And his work is always rich with audacious playfulness: he seems to take God on, knowing God will win, as if he's having an argument with a faithful friend he knows is not going to leave. In much of theology and spirituality, God is a critical spectator to human lives, but for Herbert, his sense of relationship with God is primarily of a friendship that can never be broken. These are some of the themes Mark Oakley explores in this outstanding book'My Sour-Sweet Days contains forty well-chosen poems by George Herbert (widely considered the greatest devotional poet in the English language), each of which is followed by a short but profound reflection by Mark Oakley. The combination is excellent: richly expressive poems and accessible personal meditations. This book powerfully demonstrates how poetry can bring comfort, refreshment and renewed energy to our spiritual lives.'Professor Helen Wilcox, editor of the critically acclaimed edition of The English Poems of George Herbert (Cambridge University Press, 2007)'It's extremely unusual to meet anyone who isn't a specialist who has such a subtle feeling for language as Mark Oakley does.'Sir Andrew Motion, former Poet Laureate

Mark Oakley's brilliant new volume reveals George Herbert as a fine companion with whom to examine the journey of the soul - his poems are indeed 'heart-work and heaven-work'

Contents
Preface ix
The Agonie 1
Redemption 4
Easter 7
Easter Wings 11
Sinne (I) 14
Affliction (I) 17
Prayer (I) 23
The Holy Scriptures (I) 27
Even-song 30
The Windows 34
Content 37
The Quidditie 41
Deniall 44
Vanitie (I) 48
Vertue 52
The Pearl. Matth. 13 56
Unkindnesse 61
Decay 64
Jordan (II) 67
The Quip 70
Dialogue 74
Hope 78
Sinnes Round 81
Gratefulnesse 84
The Holdfast 88
Praise (II) 91
The Collar 95
The Call 99
The Pulley 102
The Flower 106
Bitter-sweet 111
The Answer 114
The Glance 117
Aaron 120
The Forerunners 124
Discipline 128
The Elixer 132
A Wreath 136
Heaven 139
Love (III) 142