Many
years ago, when I was working on my Master’s thesis, I became interested in
angels, largely because of their presence and significance in some of the books
I was studying: Lawrence’s Stone Angel, Wilson’s Swamp Angel,
and Watson’s The Double Hook.
There are many references to angels in
literature. Jack Kerouac wrote a
semi-autobiographical novel called Desolation Angels. William Carlos Williams wrote
of Allen Ginsberg that “he sees with the eyes of the angels." Gregory Corso,
who has been described as a “streetwise angel poet,” wrote quite a lot about angels, including a passage I particularly liked in his poem "Power":
Angels
of Power come down with cups of vengeance
They
are demanding compensation.
People!
Where is your Power?
The
angels of Power are coming down with their cups!
I've
also always liked the description of the hierarchy of heavenly angels with its nine levels
from the first sphere (Seraphim, Cherubim,
Thrones) to the second sphere (Dominions, Virtues,
Powers) down to the third sphere (Principalities, Archangels, Angels.)
They are all powerful, but the angels are the only ones to actually walk
amongst us, in part because they are the only ones who have feet.
Leonard Cohen wrote songs and
poems about angels, and he spoke of his interest in angels in a conversation
with poet and novelist Robert Sward. “An angel has no will of its own,” he said. “An
angel is only a messenger, only a channel.”
By definition,
angels are known to appear suddenly, to have a quality of illumination, and to
carry a message. That came to me with regard to an observation I heard recently. In
explaining his reasons for liking Dr. Bonnie Henry, my friend’s son said,
“She’s like a combination of the best Mum you could imagine, a razor-sharp
scientist, and also an angel.”
Dr. Henry does
meet those angelic criteria: appearing suddenly on all the media, having a bright presence, and
conveying important messages.
These angels work in mysterious ways. They are channels that make us connect things – across
years, generations, landscapes and dimensions. They make us pay attention to their
communications, often about very important things that are not easily seen and that require work to comprehend.
In the
conversation mentioned above, Cohen said, “We sense that there is a will that
is behind all things, and we're also aware of our own will, and it's the
distance between those two wills that creates the mystery that we call
religion. It is the attempt to reconcile our will with another will that we
can't quite put our finger on, but we feel is powerful and existent. It's the
space between those two wills that creates our predicament.”
If we think of Nature
as being a will that is behind all things, then perhaps this is a time for us to
try to align our will with that larger perspective.
It’s something to think
about.
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