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Unless otherwise noted, the original translations and poems on this site are by middlingpoet and are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
Category Archives: Divine Riddles
The Great Hides in the Small
The circle’s in the point, the fruit is in the seed: Seek God within the world, and you are wise indeed. ~ Angelus Silesius, CW IV. 158
Posted in Angelus Silesius, Divine Riddles, Translations
Tagged Angelus Silesius, Christianity, Poetry
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What Love?
What love is this of thine, that cannot be In thine infinity, O Lord, confined, Unless it in thy very person see Infinity, and finity, conjoined? What! Hath thy Godhead, as not satisfied, Married our manhood, making it its bride? … Continue reading
Prayer (I)
Prayer the church’s banquet, angels’ age, God’s breath in man returning to his birth, The soul in paraphrase, heart in pilgrimage, The Christian plummet sounding heaven and earth: Engine against the Almighty, sinners’ tower, Reversed thunder, Christ-side-piercing spear, The six-days … Continue reading
Seraphim
O man, I’m nobler far than all the Seraphim. What they are, I’ll become. They can’t be what I am. ~ Angelus Silesius, Cherubinischer Wandersmann IV.145
Posted in Angelus Silesius, Divine Riddles, Translations
Tagged Angelus Silesius, Christianity, mysticism, Poetry
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A Grain of Sand
Why can’t we see our God within the world at hand? It strains the eye too much. The world’s a grain of sand. ~ Angelus Silesius, Cherubinischer Wandersmann VI.262
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Tagged Angelus Silesius, Christianity, mysticism, Poetry
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God’s Alter-Ego
I am God’s other self. He finds in me alone What’s most eternally alike unto His own. ~ Angelus Silesius, Cherubinischer Wandersmann I.278
Posted in Angelus Silesius, Divine Riddles
Tagged Christianity, devotion, mysticism, Paradox, Poetry, riddles
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I am as God, and God as I
God is as small as I, I am as great as He; I can’t be under Him, nor He be over me. ~ Angelus Silesius, Cherubinischer Wandersmann I.10
Posted in Angelus Silesius, Divine Riddles, Translations
Tagged Christianity, Paradox, Poetry
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Without me, no God
God can’t live without me – an instant at the most: If I went out of being, He’d give up the ghost. ~ Angelus Silesius, Cherubinischer Wandersmann I.8 * * * * * … Continue reading
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Life and Death
I.30. There’s no such thing as death. I don’t believe in death. I die each day and find Each time a better life than what I left behind. I.31. The Everlasting Death To God I live and die. To live … Continue reading
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The Question
This poem seems suitable for Eastertide. It’s out of the files, perhaps from 10 years ago. I think it was written under the influence of sixteenth-century pastoral poetry–Raleigh, Spenser, and the like–with a good bit of nineteenth-century Blake thrown in. I … Continue reading
Posted in Divine Riddles, mysticism
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The Middle Room 