Sensible Vessel
By Mia Schilling Grogan
Let us not soundproof our hearts
-- Pope Francis from his Homily at the Mass to Open the Global Synod, 10 October 2021
Where shall I place my heart
so it can taste the air? See the streets?
I think, on my sleeve, is the likely spot,
or maybe, like the Sacred or Immaculate,
pinned on a refulgent badge
and centered on my chest,
exposed and receptive to waves
vibrating across the neighbor’s lawn
or faintly rippling to us from seas
across the world, where boats go down.
It cannot stay sheathed in this body
even as I turn to its chambered
pulsing to placate fear.
Breathing, breathing slowly,
when synapses misfire
and my fingers curl,
I touch the kiwi’s skin, smell
the laundry to ground myself,
re-turn this drum to its tidal beat.
Sometimes I close its ears.
But even swaddled in distractions
and pumping circuits of restive need,
it sometimes tastes a stranger’s tears.
Remarkably, it smells trees burning,
touches the hair of children on a shore.
Let me unwrap completely
this most sensible vessel,
tune its ears to grief and joy; train its eyes
on hope, teach its fingers to plait
with other hearts sturdy nets of love.
Artist Statement
The epigraph here taken from Pope Francis’ homily to begin the Synod on Synodality evoked a way of speaking about the heart’s capacities that may sound strange to modern readers, but which was a well-known concept in the medieval spiritual literature that I study, especially in the Benedictine and Cistercian traditions: the heart exercises the spiritual senses of seeing, hearing, tasting, smelling, touching. Medieval mystics often spoke about listening with the “ear of the heart,” for instance. My poem seeks to encourage all of us to keep our hearts open to the experiences of the world – even as we face the fears and anxieties that might turn us inward at times. My use of the word "sensible" in the title leans towards the archaic meaning -- capable of sensing -- and perhaps calls into question what it actually means to be "sensible" in more modern terms.
About the Artist
Mia Schilling Grogan is an associate professor of English at Chestnut Hill College. She is a medievalist who specializes in hagiography and women’s spiritual writing. Her poems have appeared in many journals including America, First Things, and Presence: A Journal of Catholic Poetry. In 2023 she was pleased to win third place in the Catholic Literary Arts Sacred Poetry Contest, a Laureate’s Choice award in the Maria Faust Sonnet Contest, and an Honorable Mention in the Fare Forward Poetry Competition.