The Book and the Cup

by Jessica Powers

I am reading out of the book of my own evil;

I am drinking out of the cup of my own shame

here in the darkness with no candle lit.

The Hand of God is holding the book for me,

and I am reading it.

He is holding the cup and its drink is liquid flame.

Where can I hide from this vast condemnation?

The Face of God is merciful, is kind;

yet my own script is pitiless to accuse,

and the deep draught of my own conscience sears.

I try, as once, to make escape through weeping;

but here one sees more clearly through one's tears.

Oh, to be lost, destroyed, obliterated!

To have the self in me erased and done!

Would I were naked spirit holding God

and all else nothingness, oblivion…


Yet since the Will of God presents this book,

I would not turn from it to look upon

the fairest poetry that earth has given.

I would not trade this cauterizing cup

for all the wines in heaven.

Jessica Powers

1905 – 1988


Early Years (1905 - 1936)

  • Born and raised in  Mauston, Wisconsin
  • Both her father and older sister had died by her thirteenth birthday
  • Returned to raise her brothers after her mother's death in 1925
  • She published over 100 poems before 1936

Carmelite Community (1941 - 1988)

  • Entered the Milwaukee community of the Carmel of Mother of God, as a postulant In 1941
  •  In 1942, she received the habit of the Carmelites and was given the religious name of Sister Miriam of the Holy Spirit.
  • As a mystic Jessica expresses in her poetry the direct, intense, immediacy of God's presence.

Poem Structure

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