Poem Inspired by "Honey from Stone"

I have written a few poems that were inspired by Chet Raymo's nonfiction books, Honey from Stone and Climbing Brandon. The following poem was a rearrangement of the words of Meister Eckhart, as seen in Raymo's Honey from Stone:

“Put on Your Jumping Shoes”—Found Poem

(the words of Meister Eckhart, 14th Century mystic,
as found in Chet Raymo’s “Honey from Stone”)

Up noble soul!
Put on your jumping shoes
Which are intellect and love!

The eye by which I see God
Is the same eye
By which he sees me.

My eye and the eye of God are

One eye
One vision
One knowledge &

One love.


Up noble soul!
Put on your jumping shoes
Which are intellect and love!

[Arrangement by Robert M. Coughlin
March 23, 2004]

For more informantion on Mesiter Eckhart, click on this link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meister_Eckhart.

Here's another poem, this time inspired by another great book, Thomas Cahill's, How the Irish Saved Civilization:

St. Colmcille’s Illumination

In medieval Ireland
The miraculous happened every day:

St. Colmcille loved books so much
He “borrowed” his master’s illuminated psalter,
And in the dark began to copy it
By hand, ink against vellum.

Starlight, moonlight, and the
Five fingers of the saint’s left hand glowed--

Illuminating his right hand as he copied down,
In his beautiful Irish hand,
The precious psalms.

Brought before King Diarmait
For this little indiscretion, the King ruled:
“To every cow her calf . . .

To every book its copy."

Robert M. Coughlin
April 4, 2008

Chet Raymo and "Science Musings"

One of the world's great geniuses, and American National Treasure, is the scientist, teacher, and writer Chet Raymo. Chet has written two of my favorite books: Climbing Brandon: Science and Faith on Ireland's Holy Mountain; and Honey from Stone: A Naturalist's Search for God. For desciptions of all sixteen of his books, check this link: http://www.sciencemusings.com/books/ . Both of these books are set in Ireland (Raymo has a home on the Dingle Peninsula, the Gaeltacht (Irish-speaking) area of County Kerry, Ireland). Chet Raymo has such a broad learning, you wonder how a human being in one lifetime could acquire such knowledge and wisdom. He combines the mind of a physicist-astronomer with the heart of a poet and a spirit aching for God.

Besides Chet Raymo's wonderful books, he writes columns under the title of "Science Musings" (http://www.sciencemusings.com/about/) and has a related blog at http://www.sciencemusings.com/blog/ .

Here is a brief description of Chet Raymo from his "Science Musings" website:

About Chet Raymo

Chet Raymo is Professor Emeritus at Stonehill College in North Easton, Massachusetts. He is the author of twelve books on science and nature, including Skeptics and True Believers, An Intimate Look At the Night Sky, The Path: A One-Mile Walk Through the Universe, and most recently Walking Zero: Discovering Cosmic Space and Time Along the Prime Meridian. His work has been widely anthologized, including in the Norton Book of Nature Writing and annual editions of Best American Science and Nature Writing. He is a winner of a 1998 Lannan Literary Award for his nonfiction work, and the subject of a biographical essay in American Nature Writers. Raymo has authored three novels: In the Falcon's Claw, Valentine, and The Dork of Cork, which was made into a major film.

Here is a link to the Wikipedia entry on Chet Raymo: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chet_Raymo

I would love to meet Chet Raymo some day. He has certainly inspired me to climb Mt. Brandon, one of Ireland's great holy mountains--one of these days! I'm proud that he has degrees from my alma mater, the University of Notre Dame.

I've written some poems inspired by Climbing Brandon and Honey from Stone and will post them at some future date.