Brother, contemplate poetry, great profane poetry. Where is the source of its inspiration, what is its essence? It lies in the fact that the artist evokes beautiful things that have happened and whose beauty time has taken away. In such poetry, a certain regret always resonates. And it is precisely this that makes it pathetic. We, who strive to be believing people and men of prayer, perceive a different kind of poetry and we should express it. We see beautiful things whose beauty will not fade and which we receive in increasing measure. Such poetry is not made pathetic by regret, but by hope or gratitude.
(Father Jerome /1907–1985/, monk of the Trappist monastery in Sept-Fons,
correspondence)
