Bonnie Naradzay

Cloud of Unknowing					
 
All I do is eat, sleep, drink, and be negligent.
                        John of Dalyatha, monk and mystic (690-780)
 
Just how did Paul arrange his days?
All those Epistles must have taken time.
Distraction was not possible for him.
One monk moved into a pharaoh’s tomb
to get away from it all.  Yet from the midden
heaps and notes he left behind, it seems 
he was busy arranging deliveries of spices 
or asking his sister for clothes and food,
although fasting is said to focus the mind.
Sleeping can keep one from praying
unceasingly so was often discouraged,
but why fight a losing battle?  No rest
for the weary, my mother used to say,
though she stayed in bed later each day,
practicing negligence, dreaming away.
Simeon of Stylites lived on top of a pillar
for over 35 years near Aleppo, which must
have been hard to do.  What could he do
to cope but pray and stare up at the sun
or haul his food in a bucket with a rope?
Why does my mind wander during prayer?
John of Dalyatha lived in a monastery
on the mountain where Noah’s ark
was found, which could have sparked
his lectio divina in a profound way.
I went to Madonna House downtown
to stay overnight in their Poustinia 
space and promptly fell asleep,  
feeling not negligent, but released.
Prayer can lead to a meditative state –
a cloud of unknowing, a mystical place.

Copyright by Bonnie Naradzay for 2025

Bio:

Bonnie Naradzay’s manuscript will be published this year by Slant Books.  For years, she has led weekly poetry sessions at homeless shelters and a retirement community, all in Washington DC.  Poems, three of which have been nominated for Pushcarts, have appeared in AGNI, New Letters, RHINO, Tampa Review, EPOCH, Dappled Things, and many other places. While at Harvard she was in Robert Lowell’s class on “The King James Bible as English Literature.” In 2010 she was awarded the University of New Orleans Poetry Prize – a month’s stay in Northern Italy – in the South Tyrol castle of Ezra Pound’s daughter Mary.  There, Bonnie had tea with Mary, hiked the Dolomites, and read drafts of Pound’s translations. Her web site is https://www.bonnienaradzay.com

Donation Appeal:
To help victims of cancer and to help foster continuing research into this deadly disease, please consider donating to either The American Cancer Society or The Leukemia and Lymphoma |Society.

Thank you

30 for 30 is sponsored by Potomac Review