Madeleine L'Engle Quotes

“The winter is cold, is cold. All’s spent in keeping warm. Has joy been frozen, too? I blow upon my hands Stiff from the biting wind. My heart beats slow, beats slow. What has become of joy?

“When will you come and how will you come and will we be ready”

And yet - I love you, darling, yet I sat with someone at a table And gloried in our minds that met As sometimes strangers’ minds are able

Poetry and prayer are synonymous in my life, and because both are a gift, which I accept with joy and sometimes pain, I seldom know whether I have served the gift well or ill. But perhaps that doesn’t really matter; the important thing is to be willing - to want to serve the gift whenever it comes, either as verse or prayer...

If joy’s gone from my heart Then it is closed to You Who made it, gave it life...

“...And you, behind the footlight’s lure, Kissing an actress on the stage, Will leave her presence there, I’m sure, As I my people on the page.”

“Why, my Lord, did you have to bring Me down from the safety of my hill Into the danger of your will?”

“...O God, here, as so often, I cannot help. Let me not forget she is your child and your concern makes mine as nothing.”

“Pain is a partner I did not request; This is a dance I did not ask to join; whirled in a waltz when I would stop and rest, Jolted and jerked, I ache in bone and loin. Pain strives to hold me close in his embrace; If I resist and try to pull away His grasp grows tighter; closer comes his face; hotter his breath. If he is here to stay Then must I learn to dance this painful dance, Move to its rhythm, keep my lagging feet In time with his. Thus have I a chance To work with pain, and so may pain defeat. Pain is my partner. If I dance with pain Then may this wedlock be not loss but gain.”