THERESE IN

THEORY

MICHAEL

BOLERJACK

Therese in Theory © 2012 Michael Bolerjack

Therese in Theory

I once said a prayer to the saint to ask her to send a rose to my wife. I got up and went to the kitchen for a glass of orange juice and there on the floor was a perfect dried rose. I asked my wife about it. She said just a few minutes before she had cleaned the kitchen floor and there was nothing there. I told several people about it the next few days. Some believed, though some were skeptical. I went a few days later to buy a statue of the saint. The woman who sold it to me said, ask her to send you a rose and she will. I said she already did.

tessera [L, prob. ultim. fr. Gk tessares four; fr. its having

four corners] 1: a small tablet (as of wood, bone or

ivory) used by the ancient Romans as a ticket, tally,

voucher, or means of identification 2: a small piece (as

of marble, glass or tile) used in mosaic work

Tessera is the pieces of my life in writing, fragments from

a man who himself underwent fragmentation and self-

deconstructed, under the form and pressure of the time,

and from my own personal sins, mistakes and ignorance.

Tessera is also the time of the Tess to come, Teresas and

Therese, in a catholicity at once little, heroic, mystical and

practical, to explicate our corrupt time of implications,

while being simple, supplicatory and perhaps itself in

need of interpretation. Tessera is also the Esse or essence

of art and the weight of the tare that is subtracted when

the mere container is removed and the net weight is

discovered. These pieces then, arranged as a history, tell

my identity, and vouch for truth, while amounting to the

removal of myself from the account, the tare torn.

Logics of

The Rose

1:

Steps

2:

Lese Majesty

3:

Tessera

4:

The Seer

I Faith, Hope, Love: Envois of Therese, Laws of Littleness II Story of a Soul: Signifying Saint, Prophetic Poet III T E S S E R A 1 Carmel Crossing 2 Economic Esthetics 3 Graceful Glory 4 Logical Love IV Re These: The Seer

PLAN I The Vocation II Aesthetic In Carmel III T E S S E R A IV There SE

In acknowledgment

Around my name, square ringing: BKLM,

being, knowing, loving, morally, in all you are,

you all metaphysics of the good, you are already

inscribed in my boxed corner, my gnomon, and

with me, we indicate the hour and the direction,

ever upward. At last, the work ends where it

began, to complete the ring, the symbols, the

tokens, the identity once broken, the effraction

of the I that I was, my dehiscence, and more. In

the first poem, perhaps, I wrote in 1985, the one

for St. Joan of Arc, I made a curious mistake in

my French, which I did not know well, and had

the saint say not je m’apelle but flatly and I

might say stubbornly je suis. And now, looking

back over 25 years and after having learned to

read, I see Christ smiling at me from my youth

when I knew Him not, but had only heard of

Him. JE SU (I) S. Yes, Lord, you were with me

always. The Tess is like that, a little word in the

right place in the mosaic, put there by the poet

in me whom we know is the real man, Jesus, the

eternal imagination. So, I acknowledge those

greater debts I owe to Jesus, to Joan, and to

Therese, to the saints like Anthony, and Francis

and Bonaventure, and the many titles of Mary,

Our Lady of Carmel, of Fatima, Guadalupe, of

Lourdes and others. I would ring them in, I

would bring in sheaves, I who sowed in tears

and now at harvest smile. Oh the whiter saints

ravest, oh starving in the harvest, how they do

rave, as Joan once, and as Therese, my hinge,

everything, in grace. I have heard the breaking

of the chains by the ringing of holy bells, circles

stepped out of, and drowned by pealing pleas,

stepped for believing, a being neither gloss nor

glare, but more like light, knelling knelt moral

beauty. The seer, signatory, tessellated, there,

regard the se, the signature effect of, little by

little, Tess era, her flowers these, not of rhetoric

but far rather of theology. In that more moral

beauty, ever set, in the least piece of a mosaic,

flowered, found fit, found first. A law not mine,

but given, gift of a rose, He arisen, sixteen even,

for God and for her, mothers, sisters, wives, all

saints, virgin martyrs, who knew when I did not

know. It was not only as if, but truly I was not

and had not, would not have, without their

prayers. If I have and will have been seen to

have had, it was but by grace, and a mystic rose.

If risen I one day be, though books cease and all

knowledge falls away, yet if I will be, it will be

because of a love that is really one, love of truth,

truth making love, honesty. The sincerity of the

saints, humble, virtuous, patient, waiting not in

vain but in mercy, still accepting sacrifice,

suffering for truth, in love, tears and smiles at

once both with and without contradiction, in

joyful pain, in crosses His, just one crossing,

thou, passionate, teach passions thine, so finding

thy true passion, we did but transpassionate with

thee.

The (Ste) PS

Therefore I would write in conclusion not my

own signature but search for the hand of

Therese in her works and these. She, the muse,

as I have said, she but little, and yet so great, she

child-like, yet so mature, she of the little way,

the little flower, yet a doctor of the church, who

taught love by her example not unique but based

on gospel truths of the Father and Love, of

humility, patience, of suffering into the truth of

Christ. She helps place within reach of us

common folk a spirituality that does not confine

but defines us as ones who must do the little

things well, the duties of our state in life, and I

fear that in this work I have attempted a thing

that was not really necessary, and neglected

people and things that I should have done

instead. But there are many ways to Heaven in

the following of the one way. There may even

be intellectuals in Heaven. I do not know.

Therese was not an intellectual, but she had a

genius. Perhaps all real genius is untaught and

comes only from God. I have written elsewhere

of Therese, at the conclusion of the fragmentary

“postscript” placed earlier in this volume, as I

defended her being made a doctor against those

who think her a lightweight. So I have heard

catholic philosophy department members

murmur. Therese was no teaching

“professional.” She taught in the real dialectic.

She teaches still from heaven, and that fact

alone is sufficient. In the end it only matters

whether or not we get to God, or live in relation

with the Real. Therese was idealized after death,

but in her ideal and real combine to go against

the system of the scholastic, to be amateur, yes

to be a girl, and yes to be enthusiastic,

charming, a part of her age, and yet the way I

think the future of a truly catholic theology is to

be, simple, direct, universal, not burdened by

concepts, loving, little, trusting in the mercy of

God, giving flowers, sending roses to those you

love, and that she does, believe me. She did for

me. At my baptism I smelled roses and only

found out much later that that was a sign of the

presence of Therese. She truly has spent her life

in Heaven doing good on earth. If my work

comes into your hands, it will have been

because of her. I believe she wrote my life in

some sense and this work, too. The seer, she,

regarding theses on moral beauty and showing

the arrival of a logic for the renewal of a Church

in desperate straits, cutting off both modern

dialectic and postmodern deconstruction in

order for the Church to become truly catholic, to

walk the walk that it always has taught, to walk

behind Christ, not judging others, but including

the lost, the sinner, blessing the world rather

than cursing it, reforming self in order to await

the wedding feast of the bridegroom with joy, to

be but a little one, but in that a little one that is

unrepeatable, unexampled, who said yes to her

spouse, to be yes a little victim, to be yes

consumed by God’s love. Like Mother Teresa

for whom Therese was an inspiration, to say yes

to Jesus in simplicity. We do not need a more

complex theology, or to know the mysteries as

they are. Others centuries ago worked out all

those fine details. What we need is the practice

to match our theory. Here it is that the current

Church is and perhaps has ever been lacking.

The gospel is simple and but they say hard to

do. By our own will and effort it is impossible,

but for God all things are possible. Just look at

Therese, who accomplished so much without

implication or complication or even much

explication, but by supplication, by her prayers,

by her willingness, her trust, she dared to hope,

to really believe all things, to exemplify the true

catholicity by passion, to answer the call. She

proclaimed the aspect of the catholic economy

most basic to us, our vocation to love. To love is

to make, do, be, but without having to: just

allowing love to.

Re: These

Once, ten years ago on this day, feast day of Our

Lady of Mount Carmel, a woman asked me: if I

love you and you love me, can we be married? I

said yes to that woman, and she became my

wife, still with me now. In latter days, another

asked, I do not know, but I believe: if I love you

and you love me, can we be written? And again

I said yes, and these books came to be as they

are, done under the guidance of their seer

Therese. So much has passed in the 25 years of

my authorship, from deconstruction to faith in

Christ, from all the evils a man could do, to

trying now to be the man Jesus wants me to be.

Tessera is a kind of story of my soul, the moral

and intellectual record of my climb out of the

abyss, at times confessional, or critical,

conscious of where the truth is calling, or

sometimes wandering and questioning my

vocation as writer and as a man. Of course, as

Therese teaches, the vocation is to love, and

these books both reflect and exemplify that one

love within us and abroad, love for God, for

truth, for language embodied in literature and

for the holiness embodied in the saints. For a

work that is at heart theological and catholic, it

might seem strange that more is not said by me

on the scandals of the Church during the time of

my writing. I would say that in essence for the

Catholic Church to arrive, it must suffer a de-

capitalization, to go from big C to little c, to

embrace the way of littleness taught by Therese,

and be not the Catholic Church, but a catholic

church, universal, not for the Roman bias, but to

be one for the world, impartial, as God is. If, as

Benedict XVI said on his ascension to the see of

Peter, the doors are open, let them be opened

wider still, to include the whole world as it is,

not as the curia would have it to be. Jesus said to

the deaf man: Be open! He still speaks to us that

word today. The church catholic must be open.

And Jesus also said: The first will be last, the

last will be first. Truth is on the side of the little

ones, the least, while power seems to be on the

side of the leaders who do not truly lead but

have already gone astray. It would be better that

a stone were tied about their necks, than to

cause harm to any little one. But they have

caused many to stumble, and have over a long

history killed the prophets of the reform of the

church, or silenced them, in the name of the

Church herself, which they identify with Rome,

not with all the little ones. Scripture is eternal,

the situation of the gospel is always the same.

Be open! The first will be last, the last will be

first. Through this may come the glasnost and

the restructuring of Catholicism. This is almost

all I have to say about the trouble with the

Church. I remain her son, but more catholic in

intent, following the inviolability of conscience

taught by the council of renewal, not as it was

reformed by the catechism to conform to the

teachings of men. God speaks within each one

of us. If we but listen. In this work I logically

reform both dialectic and de-construction,

completing the progression of realism, idealism,

nihilism, grace. Without God’s grace our

thinking comes to nothing, as can be seen, but

by Him we will receive the ring given to the

prodigal. For which of us has not been such a

one that we stand not in need of grace? We must

answer the call, the hest, be open, and break the

circle of the text of the world. The act of faith

breaks it and establishes a logic and a love

outside that hitherto known. The works were a

way for me to continually make acts of faith and

hope and love and keep alive the confidence my

parents and others placed in me, the sense of

mission given to me, the need for change.

Though I may not change the world, yet God

has changed me. These are the history of one

learning to walk by faith in His light, which

shines on all.

And Yet. Yet, not yes, but yet, and yetter, yesser still, F yes to AH, yesses still, to the grandfathers and fathers, all men, all women, grand-dames, grandmas and my mother mothering me most of all: You C! I was always wrong, let my sister tell you, it was I who was wrong, not wronged, not you, either of you, neither of you, any of you, you all, it was I who was ignorant, I who was lazy, sinner sinning still, it was I who was negligent, I who was more sinning than sinned against, I who leered when I should have reeled, who did not let Aaron’s rod bud, but withheld my seed, who did not love, but did judge all in the particulars, and generally excused myself, who did reason, rationalize, amplify, exemplify, complify, explify, flay the fly, fail afly, fly frail, to

no reply, no word, neither heard nor unheard, I starved in harvest time, myself ravest, fattest, drunken athirst, I became text rather than to teach, took every add and vantage, did not take place, took out, did not take back, exampled unredeemed, did not redeem the time, but out of jointure, held, cursing not blessing, hawking, despite real love, real friends, real family, a real God and a real world, which I said only seemed to be because I could not, would not be me, did no contextuality, did no effract I, I did not read my implied im- [plications] and called her my mother harlot: C? Not she but me. She sued me beyond in recognitions. Let be, let be, AH to Charlotte in Spring. Let go, she would prophesy me, my laze of employment, my

hazed lonelistnesses, my all together brokenness, est, established: the wheel that could not turn, flat flayed, I thought I was centered at the stills, but pointed out knot fescue, for you, four you, the famous family of mine, I did not lay down, but was already lebel to the growned, torned, like Rimbaud, ay sixteen, at AH, IAH, ich been einer, nein, huffing, puffing, man, I knew you not, not even at the heartbreak and teras of mary. CH knew too much, C? Hurts her still I fear, I said no bye, like dedalus in my way, not flying or artificer, afailed, A. We were both blinded to ourselves, she in potent prophetically, I impotently, I legally but blinded, how antimomian, no man, no mom, no moon, no sun, no son, sinning, not shining, no. Pretender to faith’s crown. Without Works.

Show me I said your work, but did not see the work to be done all around me, the harvest, I flayed to labor over textual under my affliction failing, my chronosis of the time, miss diagnosis, both, C/not C, both sane and insane and both at the same time. Tradiction C? On. Was become as I be held. Dee con stricted structured, destroyed, dead almost but not quit, I became impossible, THE impossible, literarily, YET: here I am yes. Father told me: Reft AH. Be reft. How can I? Yet, yes I am. And the priest said to me: IM IT. I AM IT. Cannot not be, if I will believe I will be. Despite Big D, dig B? Cause God, grace, gift, merciful He, and the chastisement of my Charlotte and Michael and BO and AH and all in all. Flayed, yet. SEEMS TO ME. Corrections, I

was a text to be emended, amen. Amen not yet man. TO BE OR AS IF. Purging, the over exposure of my denial of the truth, C, so that I did not C my self-denial, A is A. No step yetter. No step to a stepper, C ANDY. What Can I Say? I missed you ever, hospitality. EVER. Missed you, read retractions, extractions, impactions, unattractions, dismissing, dismal, abyss, my history, AH knew TO BE. The abyss to be is the abyss to come. All past, papaw. Sending sinner sent, cyn, in syn, to cinders. Song you 2. Fors. U. But you all were hear all along, had I never knew who you were, but I never knew who you were at all. AH! Delighted, relieved, regretted, con-tempted. I AM ALL THAT. And hear, on this independence day, fourth of Julio, in US, and I am IT

in IT, never knowing another, but not faithful in that, but afraid, YET: I have heard of another country. Somewhere. Over yonder, beautiful, but, ah, bright wings, specimen, here I AM. That there is such a place be yonder I heaven heard but have not scene, if I will someday, walk on that Englander green, I do not no, but be leave. Desire it so, no de serve it. And cannot say none do, only that Aye do not, yet I may steal, good thief walk there, not by my own efforts, whatever they amount to, a breath, or less than a breath, but by His Graciousness. AH! Every-thing is grace, Therese said. She finds those lost, son. I was one too. Can’t O Son The Chaos, These Son Moral Beauty. My cantos and theses she did right, emend and even more she: the AH there(se)!

became, forgiver, tessera, a mosaic law, Moses promised, I but dinned thy steps in me.

____________________

For THE MUSE on

THE STEPS:

SAINT THERESE

VIRGIN AND DOCTOR

OF THE CHURCH

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