To Know the Dark

Three weeks into winter and already when I return to the house after

morning prayers the stars I greeted on the way to the prayer cabin are receding as daybreak saunters in. While I celebrate Earth's turn toward the Sun at this cusp of winter, I do not want the long dark days to pass hurriedly.

I attempted to recite Wendell Berry's poem, "To Know the Dark" [1] at our Winter Solstice gathering this year. With guests listening around the fire in the gazebo, I stumbled miserably over the words. Nevertheless, they, being gracious friends, entered into reflection about the lesser-known gifts of the dark. That conversation began a longer one that I've been having with myself and others. Now--not quite a month into winter--that poem has joined other memorized pieces, sitting beside hymns, choruses and scripture in my Gray Matter Library to be called upon as desired or needed.

To Know the Dark To go in the dark with a light is to know the light. To know the dark, go dark. Go without sight, and find that the dark, too, blooms and sings, and is traveled by dark feet and dark wings.

I've recited Wendell's words to a few directees at the beginning of our spiritual direction sessions and have been nudged deeper by several responses on comfort and discomfort with darkness, and a desire to welcome the dark, rather than to quickly diffuse it with light, even if the way feels shaky.

Welcoming the dark sits at odds with how we tend to think about it. The word darkness often depicts evil and suffering. Dispelling darkness is, after all, a prominent theme in scripture. Jesus is the Light of the world, coming into our darkness to show us the way out. Followers of Jesus are called to be lights and to shine. We are invited to know the Light, as we go into dark places with it. Still, I've been wondering how we might nuance our relationship with the dark, might see the dark as more complex than simply the opposite of all that is good.

For starters, here's a very brief list of gifts of the dark. You can likely add to it as you begin to think along these lines:

• in the dark, loamy fertile soil beneath the surface nurtures and grows living things, including our spiritual selves

• similarly in the dark zygot becomes embryo becomes fetus becomes baby (and pup, kit, kid, lamb and piglet--to name a few)

• for diurnal creatures (like humans) a walk in the dark requires slow, attentive, and careful steps, heightening our awareness to what we see, feel, and hear

• deep dark (akin to a cave) invites us to simply be still, to act not, and to wait in patience [2]. Elsewise, we might smash into rock walls or fall into chasms in our frantic efforts to get out

• in the dark we see things like stars and hear sounds like owls that can't be seen or heard in the light

While some of this is metaphor, not all of it is, and besides, metaphors offer substance when other explanations fail. Stories and experiences of many suggest that in the dark (both metaphoric and not) we can experience God in ways less accessible in the light. You might have such a story.

One of my directees ended our conversation about the dark by saying, "We say 'the light in me sees the light in you. Perhaps," she continued, "we might also say, 'the dark in me sees the dark in you.'" I've been pondering that. Having the dark in us seen by someone whose dark we are invited to see allows us to be known not only as we present ourselves to others (and often to ourselves), but also as we are in hidden realms.

Some of these realms grow us in empathy for how others suffer in their hidden places and let others hold us in our own hidden sufferings. To have the dark in you see the dark in me might make confessing easier, and I might become your confessor, too. Sharing space in our dark places might help us hold the hardness of unanswered questions, of prayers answered with silence.

Other of these sacred and precious realms are places where we have been touched by the Unknown-Yet-Knowable-One we can't easily describe with words. Maybe having the dark in you see the dark in me allows us to validate the mysterious ways God moves in our lives that stir beneath and beyond words. Apophatic prayer is prayer without words, ideas or images. To pray this way is to come into the presence of God in stillness and silence, without expectation for insight or understanding or conversation or even a subsequent warm fuzziness. Rather, apophatic prayer is an active awakeness to our aliveness, sensing we are resting in unfathomable Mystery, who resides in dark places within us, even as that same divine Mystery is the source of light, life, and love--a place that blooms and sings.

[1] Wendell Berry (1970), in his poetry collection, Farming, A Handbook.

[2] A reference to 17th century Quaker James Naylor, who wrote: Art thou in the darkness? Mind it not that it not fill thee more. Stand still, act not, and wait in patience till Light arises to lead thee.