Gospel Animari Options

[RC James]

Abelard’s classrooms hummed with insight,
he introduced logic seductively,
and illumined charges of revision.

(Respondet triplici, rerum condiciones,
Verbal per curiositatem.)

Walking the sodden streets, virgin thoughts
bounded beside him.
Devoted to the altar of God and son, renewed,
he undid the racky syllabus grown musty.

Heloise, niece of a lord restraining her thoughts,
whispered to her classmates wanting changes.

(Novos mundos oculos habuit,
Sensum, linguis loquentur novis.)

She released will o`the wisp
from papers of antiquated hubris
and looked for a guide, a teacher,
who espoused possibility in all,
any willing man, woman immortal , entire.

Only a solitary saint testing women's waters
witnessed her abrupt conversion in his lecture,
when, at the podium, she saw the half of herself
she thought she'd never find, shining, fast, in his eyes.

(Ratione deseritur, in faciem illius,
Sive ex passione apprehendens.)

Clarity spoke to both; beyond breath,
they forsook all to sigh's effusion,
love streamed agua pura freshets
lucid as words that hold their own rain.

(Tenebris cito secuta sunt confusi et gaudium.)



(1. Answers came on different levels, different situations
through verbal explorations.

2. Her eyes held new worlds, new understanding,
new languages.

3. Logic deserted him in face of her beauty
passion took hold.

4. Darkness quickly followed the embarrassment of joy.)