Water and fire deride

The consensus is in: for Victorians, yesterday was the hottest day on record, and that almost on the back of our hottest stretch of days in history. Those questioning the reality of climate change may have faced something of a challenge over the past two weeks, as the state's weather exceeded even the normal scorch of February, and many - myself included - pondered the philosophical (and deeply practical) question of how to keep cool in a responsible way.

Sometimes it was simply a case of biting the bullet. Not believing in air conditioning is certainly put to the test when the mercury passes 40 degrees many days in a row. One of my most idealistic work friends admitted to feeling that she was creating something of a rod for her own back in not having any cooling. But it's a question that we will certainly have to address much more in future Februaries. If our use of power has been irresponsible up to this point, continuing to use cooling as we have done in the past will not be a fair way to combat rising temperatures. The temptation to use more power for cooling purposes will only increase, as will the need not to use it. Days like yesterday may be becoming much more commonplace, as frightening as that sounds.

For those dancing at the Night Cat in Fitzroy last night, it was a time of celebration. We had beat the heat. We were still alive. The front man of the funk band playing there last night announced that the day would go down in history, and that we should be proud to have survived it. But anyone who read the papers or watched/listened to the news today will know that, at the very least, 35 people didn't survive, and the numbers are expected to rise in future hours and days.

Anyone who feels like the world is operating seriously out of kilter would have good reason to do so. Queensland has more rain than it needs right now, while my state is bone dry. Naturally, I'm drawn to the metaphor of it all. T.S. Eliot's poetry in particular offers all manner of neat quotes and images. The title of his famous poem "Ash-Wednesday" has significance for Victorians that has been renewed in the past 24 hours. Yesterday saw our worst bush fires since that infamous day, and the poem speaks of renewal, dryness and death in a way that is fairly meaningful in this time. Other poems - "Little Gidding" among them - speak of water and fire destroying what we have taken for granted, replacing our towns, ridiculing our priorities and sense of security. Yet, much as I love it, poetry has little to offer at a time like this. It can only point out the horror of our situation. It cannot change it.

And, for all our campaigns to stop climate change, we cannot change the illness in the human heart that makes people light fires and delight in them. We cannot change the foolishness of those who went out in their cars to escape the fires, only to be met by them even more fiercely. And it does not reverse the fundamental motion of death and decay that directs everything on this planet, whatever we do.

But there is renewal. There is hope, however it looks - it simply isn't in human hands. Yet it requires our hands nevertheless - to be open to accept it, and then to be ready to turn and share what has been given to us. I for one will be praying that some people can see that in this time. I don't see another way forward.

On a practical note, the Australian Red Cross are opening relief centres for those affected by the fires, and will no doubt be happy to receive donations. My advice would be to go to their website and to select "Where it's needed - Australia" under "Appeals". If anyone knows of a more direct way to donate, please let me know.

Poem

I would like my words to be
kept somewhere safe while holy light
burns in and out and through and through
and all the dross goes ashen white.

I would like these words to see
the better of those latter years,
and feel the joy, the lingering
of truth all through the death and tears

that will destroy both you and me.
I would like my words to stay;
not as my words, but to remain
as lanterns somewhere on the way

to show us what you’ve always been.
I’d like to see that: see those words
fly, disembodied, celestial, high
above the dross, above, like birds –

No, more. I’d like to see what flight
must mean to otherworldly birds
when gravity’s no hindrance to
their wings, for I have sometimes heard

whispered rumours of such things.
I’d like to hear those whispers surge,
hear my words join in the chorus
of those voices as they merge

and amplify, become a scream:
I’d like to scream along with them –
But would my voice be suited to
such perfect noise? For when

I scream, it’s with hate and ash
and lust and death; not with truth.
Then let my words be all you hear,
not my voice. Let my words be proof,

or, if not proof, faint testaments
to what, by then, will be so clear
that these words I speak will only be
one line, one note, one faint, one mere

word-arrow to the bright truth that
skies, clouds and spheres will surely shout.
I’d rather such a humble state
than lose my words when dross burns out.

Yes, I would like my words to be
kept somewhere safe while holy light
burns in and out and through and through
and all the dross goes ashen white.

I would like these words to see
the better of those latter years,
and feel the joy, the lingering
of truth all through the death and tears.

Your fortune, our morals

This sign spotted on the corner of Moreland and Pascoe Vale Roads on the way home from work today:

"Work From Home
6 Figure Salary
Serious Only
Call ------------"

Serious only? Meaning, I suppose, only call if you're serious. But what, given such little information, are you supposed to be serious about? Earning a 6 figure salary? Working from home? Does it make any difference to you to know precisely what kind of work you will be doing from home before you decide if you are serious?

Or perhaps it means, don't call this number as a joke, or, don't do this job if you have a sense of humour. Perhaps a better stipulation could be: "Non-thinkers only, please."

It makes me wonder - who exactly would ring that number? People who are passionate about working from home? Because I'm not sure how many workplaces would see that as a particularly valuable characteristic. Still, I'm not in HR. What would I know. Good luck to them, I suppose.

All the lonely people

Some years ago, when I was feeling dissatisfied with happy-clappy, "everything's great" Christian music, I found myself drawn often to the music of Jars of Clay, and the relationship has continued. Their later albums did not really live up to the promise of their early efforts, and their music has always erred more on the side of the mainstream than I'm necessarily happy with, but it's their lyrics more than anything that have been of great encouragement to me - the sort of lyrics that capture perfectly the Christian tension of suffering yet rejoicing. Their double disc release from a few years ago, "Furthermore: From the Studio/From the Stage", captured that tension particularly well, with much of the studio disc perfectly encapsulating the hope of those whose experience of suffering has left them broken but acutely aware of grace, something that allows them to continue hoping in the face of renewed suffering: "You have calmed greater waters/And higher mountains have come down."

So imagine my annoyance when, on 2003's album, "Who We Are Instead", they released something as vapid and trite as the track "Lonely People". It's always been a bit of a frustration that the song is one of the album's catchier numbers, with a cool bluesy groove to it that gets me every time. But then there's the lyrics: "This is for all the lonely people/Thinkin' that life has passed them by/Don't give up until you drink from the silver cup/Ride that highway in the sky". Now, in fairness the song is working within a genre and does so quite successfully, but it's a perfect pastiche: empty of its own meaning. Whatever else Jars of Clay were, they were always sensitive. They understood what it meant to hurt, to be broken. Sadly, it seems, they just don't know how it feels to be alone. No-one who's known true loneliness would attempt to encourage anyone with such cliched images. How anyone is expected to fight loneliness by "drinking from the silver cup" is anyone's guess. Give me Wilco's "How to Fight Loneliness". At least that song shows empathy.

So why am I writing about this today? Am I feeling particularly lonely? No, not really. I'm too busy to be lonely right now. Besides, whatever else 2009 may hold for me, it certainly isn't seeing me being bereft of friends when I need them. Though loneliness is something I've battled a lot throughout my life, now is not one of those times, thank God.

No, what prompted this post was in fact listening to that song yesterday afternoon and finding myself feeling those old, familiar feelings: that feeling, more than anything else, of being patronised by someone who didn't know what loneliness was but somehow thought they could encourage me about it. And then I found myself thinking about how I was no longer lonely, but didn't for a moment regret that I had been. Loneliness, when I've felt it, has taught me independence and a kind of self-sufficiency that's invaluable in life. But, more than that, it's taught me to rely on God in a way that I would never have done if I'd had a more bountiful supply of people to rely on.

So I found myself skipping the track, simply because I didn't need that kind of hackneyed encouragement, and saw no need to endure it any more. It also made me thankful that I've known loneliness so that, if I'm ever in a position where I am called upon to support someone else, I'll know enough how they feel not to insult them with platitudes. And I'll hopefully be able to tell them of the true comfort - one that Jars of Clay a little clumsily pointed to, but could have done so perhaps more tactfully had they just used these words:

"Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted."

I'm very grateful to know what those words mean.