Thursday, March 11, 2010
How I Want To Spend My Light
In the blog post before me someone wrote that from the title of Milton's poem "When I Consider How My Light Is Spent", you can tell it's going to be a good one. And it certainly is. What I love about this poem is that I feel there are so many ways to look at it. The first is literal, Milton is blind or going to be there soon, he sees darkness, his light is spent. The second is referring to his talent of writing poetry and how it might all be spent now that he can not see. And how hopeless it makes him feel that the loss of his sight causes him to "bury" his talents. The third that I saw(and this might just be making things up) is a lesson in how we "spend our light". We are all given talents of course but I think our light could refer to more than that. Perhaps our light could refer to our ability to love, or our willingness to help, to serve, or to be kind. I believe every person has the capacity to do good and to be full of it, to spend their light in worthy ways. It kind of reminds me of Cormac McCarthy's The Road and carrying the fire. Milton may have thought that his light was all spent but what a way to spend it. So if my light is brief, if it will soon be spent, I would like to at least make sure, when considering how my light was spent, that it is in worthwhile ways.
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Beautifully expressed! When I read this poem I reflected on an experience in my life that I felt I spent my life to the best potential. I worked with children affected with Down Syndrome for four years of my life. Each day I was with these children I was reminded that each of us have light. Both physical, emotional and spiritual. I too, like Jillian believe that Milton is expressing the urge for us to "spend our light;" don't just use it up, but make a difference.
ReplyDeleteI am well aware that each of us have had opportunities to do just that. Human character is brilliant and kind, gentle and loving. I wondered as I re-read this poem over and over, did Milton consider this question only because he was going blind - losing light? Or was he just reflecting on his life up to this point. Either way, I feel that we should anaylyze and interpret our individual "lights" and consider how they are spent.
I took a more literal meaning from this poem. When he says, half the days he spends are dark, I was thinking we was talking about the way God created the world, and in that world, half of our days are dark, or night. Something I found interesting from reading other responses to this was the recognition of blinding in this poem. I didn't think about that at all.
ReplyDeleteThrough reading this poem, the title makes more sense to me as, "When I Consider How My Life Is Spent". It seems to me that he's talking about life and how to spent life. The feeling I got from this is that serving others who need help is the way to go and the way to serve God.