I have spent the quiet moments of the last few days in bed listening to talks by poet David Whyte. In one, he briefly shared the story of St Kevin and the blackbird - a story told by Seamus Heaney in a poem of the same name. I want to tell you that story too, in my own way.
St Kevin was kneeling one morning at the open window of the chapel where he lived. The early spring dawn was bright, greening, the air full of song, and he was moved to pray. He opened up his hands, holding them up and out to the day and to his God. This is the way the Irish prayed; a way I can understand.
I imagine his mouth moving, the whisper of his words. Words of thanks, of astonishment; the same words I have whispered often in springtime. And as he prayed, so welcoming he was, so like something warm and rooted himself, a blackbird came and landed on his open palm.
Sooty-brown she sat. I imagine her singing, the soft humming sound that female blackbirds make, and her quiet, wild words joining his. I imagine his joy, oh how it must have trembled through his body. I imagine he hardly dared breathe, until at last, in an instant, she was off again.
So St Kevin went to close his palms, to end his morning prayer. I imagine he felt the surge of self and feeling that is a job well done. But then, before he could move: a flutter, a whirr. Back came the blackbird to place a small dark stick on his hand, her yellow-rimmed eye determined.
“Oh,” I imagine St Kevin thought.
And so there he stood, patiently, his palm open, still, reaching for new words to say and to feel, words of concern and words of care, while the blackbird built her nest on his hand. Twig by twig she built it until it was finished, and then settling herself in its hollow, she laid a perfect blue egg. Kevin, in his turn, held firm. He knelt there through the spring storms and he knelt there through the spring sun, the world blossoming around him, his open palm like faithful oak. He knelt there through her sitting, and he watched, learned, new words forever on his lips.
I imagine those words, too, how they must have changed, swelled, stung. From love to hate, delight, despair. It holds no interest to me to imagine him perfect, saint-like. Of course he suffered, fought, lost and found himself, dissolved, reformed. Of course he did.
The egg hatched - a bawling, squawking thing - and faithful, loving, brave and broken St Kevin held his place and his resolve as the baby bird grew and the blackbird made her busy back-and-forths. He watched this new beloved grow, learned the weight and shape of her, the moods of her, learned her desires and her sorrows, all while holding his own, until one day, at last, the baby was grown.
The blackbird and her daughter flew. Before he could think to hold these last moments in mind and memory, they were gone. And St Kevin got to close his palms. His prayer was done.
All the people I love best hold blackbirds in their hands right now. All hold the duty of care. All are living, breathing, feeling the sweetness and agony of this same living prayer.
I think of the relief that St Kevin must have felt in the end and I think of the heartbreak. How conflicted he must have felt when his palm’s weight lessened. How deep-bone tired. I wonder what was left of him at the end of it all and how tenderly he must have had to turn to himself, shaking, as vulnerable and shattered as a new egg himself.
I think about how care isn’t simple and care isn’t clean. I think of the goodness of it, the laughter and magnificence of it. I think too of the horror.
I have no lesson to share only that St Kevin knew it, I think. St Kevin knew this path.
I tell you what else I think.
I bet, one day, he went back to the window, changed. I bet he opened up his palms once again.
Lovely to hear your voice! You're getting really good at this. xx
Well that made me cry. Thank you.