#devotional works

Ms. Codex 1128 - [Mystical miscellany]

Written in Germany around 1440 CE, this manuscript is a collection of four devotional works with mystical and didactic tendencies: the first is a version of the work on the six names of the Eucharist or body of Christ (Buch von den sechs Namen des Fronleichnams or Liber de corde et sanguine domini) composed by the author known as the Monk of Heilsbronn. The second is a prose tract on the question of how to love God. The third, also in prose, focuses on the Passion of Christ. And the last one is a 12-line prose piece that names obedience, poverty, and chastity as the three virtues essential to a cleric and elevates obedience as the noblest one.

St. Patrick’s Day: Green Velvet

This small devotional book is bound in lovely green velvet. The crushed material around the spine suggests the book was cradled in a hand when it was read.

“In the times I struggle most

You were there.

I found you amongst the dirt

while I was wadding through mud.

Around you bloomed daffodils

Lilies, roses, and I even found some pearls.

I scooped your skeleton corpse up from the mud

Like a caterpillar emerging from its cocoon

You grew and grew.

As a pregnant woman, fertile, swollen, ready to bloom,

You burst yourself into my life - into my view.

Halo’d, golden, and shining you stepped forth-

My Goddess Hathor...

You were born.”

"Even in the night sky

Where the clouds dissipate.

The stars never touch

They never get to see each other.

Only when the moon is gone

Can they finally glance upon the other.

The brightest of them all

The Morningstar, he stood out."

Each glance in the mirror brings me closer to you. Every 'I love you' I say to myself, let's me reach you. For even the stars shine upon me To kiss my neck, to lick my lips, Allured by my breathtaking ways. All of it because I am one with you. The flowers that bloom up at me Eyes wide as they stare, watching, Taking me in sip by sip. All of it because you've kissed me. Nude, they desire me, in satin, I know how they crave and want me, In their beds so I can whisper in their ears-- The thing you tell me to say to myself Every time I see myself in my mirror: 'I love you'

"What's it like on the other side?

Seeing and finding bones

Touching the graveyard dirt

Feeling the dung from maggots

The rotten and all those who have spoiled."