I ended Saturday’s DM on the sensual and indigenous ceremonies with a promise to share the poem composed by M.C. Richards born of an honoring Flower Pelting Ceremony on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of her book, Centering. Here it is.
Pelted by Beauty
(after an American Indian Flower Ritual)
The power of love received in the body: This was the Festival!
how we stood and faced one another
and we took hands
and the love came.
And all the flowers swarmed about our heads:
deep, deep the sting goes.
Let love be welcomed the moment it seeks us.
In my flesh I feel it still,
the surprise and awe, the joy,
warming and swelling in my limbs and belly,
O miraculous conception! O angels tumbling through the air!
How real it is, the Christscript branded across our lips:
that we shall love one another—as if the world could ever be the same.
Over the edge, into the well, the abyss,
idiodically amorous,
nibbling at the green fronds and flinging them!
Pelted by beauty and peace,
a cellular recording, each tiny vessel
lovecrazed, opening.
The fountain erupts, cascades,
and we wish to die in it, be other,
be one in an alchemy of eros,
that lad with the arrows who shoots blind.
The power of love is received in the body,
our first and primal home.
Not enough is made of incarnation, the mysteries of birth,
of embodiments here like this in one another:
your eyes and my arched back,
our fingers softening.
Of course now we dance differently,
bowing and dipping and turning to the delicate drum.
Of course we live now in the dread of our disguises.
We know our body and offer it,
We know our need and carry our begging bowl.
Now hear with courage our own love cries,
the tender shout of readiness, yes,
I will, I do, yes, let us receive into our bodies
the divine pulse, anointed with petals,
awaken and go forth changed.
Now truly are we god’s fools,
lilies of the field, no thought for the morrow,
feeding strangers and comforting the fearful,
doing good to those who hurt us,
carrying blossoms to beat beauty and peace into our bones.*
MC tells about the experience that gave birth to so marvelous a poem (I consider it her best ever) this way: This poem was written October 13, 1989 after a ceremony in which this ritual was performed. At its climax a huge basket of flowers was poured over the poet’s head, engulfing her in their multifloriate rapture. It was she who was being celebrated in this ritual, and it was she therefore who had to be most deeply pelted, nay, pulverized by beauty! It was a magical ecstasy, moving, as the poem sings, through the body into a new behavior.
I am deeply moved by this poem and by sharing it with our DM readers this Easter and Passover Season, 2026. How deeply we need it! It brings back the magnificent wisdom and joy of our pedagogy at the University of Creation Spirituality which drew so many souls of diverse religious traditions as faculty and students.
For me, it is like a song about our school and what was happening there every day. And it blends the wisdom of Sister Jose Hobday and M.C. Richards. It is also in many ways a song to the Christ message, to incarnation, to love, to the holiness and joy of matter. This is the kind of vision that, as the poet informs us, guarantees that the world need not ever be the same.
* The poem can be found in M. C. Richards, Imagine Inventing Yellow: New and Selected Poems of M.C. Richards (Station Hill). I share it from the personal copy she shared with me before it was published.
To read the transcript of Matthew Fox’s video meditation, click HERE.
Banner Image: A postcard promoting an art exhibition by M.C. Richards at the Chester Springs Studio in Pennsylvania. From Matthew Fox’s personal collection.
Queries for Contemplation
What does this poem mean to you?
Related Readings by Matthew Fox
Whee! We, wee all the way Home: Toward a Sensual, Prophetic Spirituality.
Confessions: The Making of a Post-denominational Priest.
Original Blessing: A Primer in Creation Spirituality.
Creation Spirituality: Liberating Gifts for the Peoples of the Earth.
A Spirituality Named Compassion: Uniting Mystical Awareness with Social Justice.
Sins of the Spirit, Blessing of the Flesh: Transforming Evil in Soul & Society.
Adam Bucko and Matthew Fox, Occupy Spirituality: A Radical Vision For a New Generation.
Matthew Fox, Skylar Wilson and Jen Listug: Order of the Sacred Earth: An Intergenerational Vision of Love and Action.
Charles Burack, ed., Matthew Fox: Essential Writings on Creation Spirituality.
