The Promised Land

The end of art is in the Beloved's arms, beyond all measure, all words. Each sentence sails toward her, in full belief of reaching that shore.

***

To tell the Beauty would decrease
To state the Spell demean --
There is a syllable-less Sea
Of which it is the sign --
My will endeavors for its word
And fails, but entertains
A Raputre as of Legacies --
Of introspective Mines --

-- Emily Dickinson (#1200)

***

St. Barinthus tells St. Brendan of a voyage he has undertaken on the sea. One of his monks had approached and implored him, “Father, get into the boat and let us sail to the island which is called the Promised Land, that land which God will give us and our successors on the last day.”

He boarded the boat with his monks and sailed off into an enveloping mist. An hour later, they came to a “a spacious, lush and green” island. They tour the island for 15 days, seeing “only flowering plants and trees that bore fruit, and even the stones were precious ones.” They come to a river flowing east to west, and they consider whether to cross the river.

“As we pondered that matter in our hearts,” St. Barinthus relates to St. Brendan, “there suddenly appeared a man in great radiance before us, who immediately called us by our own names and greeted us, saying, ‘Be of good heart, my brothers. The Lord has shown this land to you, which shall be given to his holy ones. This river divides the island in two. You may not cross to the other side. Go back therefore to the place from which you have come.’

“When he had finished speaking, I immediately asked him where he came from and what his name was. He said, ‘Why do you ask me where I come from and what my name is? Why do you not ask me about the island? It has remained unchanged just as you see it now since the beginning of the world. Do you need any food, drink, or clothing? You have been here a whole year already without having anything to eat or drink. You never have felt drowsy, nor has any night fallen. For day is never-ending here, and there is no obscuring dark. Our Lord Jesus Christ himself is the light.’”

-- “The Voyage of St. Brendan”
in Celtic Christianity, 156