Waiting Around with John Milton

Could be paradise up ahead

Sometimes, if you’re feeling uncertain and sort of irrelevant, an old, dead, white-guy poem is just the thing you need to read.

I mean that in the nicest way, too. I do love a great variety of humanity, but I am essentially an archaic, white, middlebrow romantic who likes to wrestle elevated language to the ground just for the satisfaction of it.

And I turn to John Milton’s sonnet “On His Blindness” for courage, because I have been waiting a long time to see where this life of mine is going. And I don’t know if I am ever going to understand the light at the end of the road.

When I consider how my light is spent,
Ere half my days, in this dark world and wide,

John Milton lost his sight at 43. He might have written this sonnet as early as 1655, not knowing that in spite of his fears, he would still go on to complete the epic poems Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained. Still, he wrote this poem at the brink of a huge loss, believing his life work might be over much earlier than he thought.

Thankfully, I’m not going blind, but I am pretty sure I’m more than halfway through my days, and sometimes I worry that I have not said and done all I am capable of. With time, energy fades; focus scatters; accomplishments lose relevance. Even with sight, the world can look too dark and too wide.

And that one Talent which is death to hide
Lodged with me useless, …

Ah — the Talent! Scholars love this part, because it reminds them of that New Testament parable of the Talents, which they prissily remind everyone are actually coins. (Big deal. I’m not impressed by making yet another damned thing be about money.)

More simply, though, I’d guess Milton sees his gift for writing as his talent, which will be useless, he thinks, if he can’t actually see to do it.

And, yes, I admit that I’ve secretly hoped that writing could be my Talent, too: some gift of thought or perspective that is worth sharing. When I say this, I remind myself of a person who is introduced to Meryl Streep and says, with a self-conscious smile, “I’ve done a little acting, myself…”

So for John Milton, it is “death to hide” that Talent — those words, those thoughts, that poetry.

And I ask, “Is it death for an ordinary person as well? If my one Talent is to write, is it death if I don’t write, and just go about my worldly business, till the Light really does fade?”

(And what if that’s NOT my Talent? Well, crap.)

though my Soul more bent
To serve therewith my Maker, and present
My true account, lest he returning chide;

John Milton confesses, “Well, I’d really rather use that Talent to serve God, you see, so that I don’t get into trouble when God comes back.” John’s a dutiful person, who believes, or says he believes, that everything must be done For God’s Glory.

I have a version of that belief, too, even though for me, the impulse has been re-framed by a humanistic upbringing and my own agnostic vocabulary. I’d like to say I paid my way; it’s a classic dose of Protestant work ethic updated with a need to leave a smaller carbon footprint. Plus some ego I can’t seem to eradicate. So sue me.

“Doth God exact day-labour, light denied?”
I fondly ask.

So now John wants to get specific: “Look, if my Light goes out, then WTF? Do I have to just go be a roofer or a barista or something?”

Well, all you humanities graduates know what that’s about.

Q: How do you get a philosophy major off the porch?

A: Pay for the pizza.

And look — there’s not a thing wrong with being a roofer, or a barista, or a pizza runner. But if you believe you are supposed to be a writer, and you went to school to be a writer, and you have talent for being a writer, then being those other things will make you wonder whether that’s the best use of your time on the planet. But Milton doesn’t give in to that swoony uncertainty.

But Patience, to prevent
That murmur, soon replies, “God doth not need
Either man’s work or his own gifts;

See? According to Milton, the voice of Patience cuts in, pretty roughly, if you ask me: “You think God needs your punk-ass poems? Oh, you’re going to “Serve God” with your Talent ? Where do you think that Talent came from in the first place, you nitwit?”

Patience reminds Milton that those poems are just as impressive to God as those macaroni collages kids make for us in their expensive Montessori classrooms and give as fair trade for their very lives and sustenance and all.

Which is to say: those may be charming gifts for your mother, but are useless to God.

Well. What, then? Remember: Milton is devout. He knows.

who best
Bear His mild yoke, they serve Him best.

Milton knows this is the right, most authentic way to be a mensch in God’s sight and service. But I think Milton has his tongue in his cheek, on this next bit:

His state
Is Kingly. Thousands at his bidding speed
And post o’er Land and Ocean without rest:

I love the image of thousands of people, rushing around the world, Doing God’s Kingly Work as fast as they can…

Crusaders, galloping into battle with banners flying…

Missionaries, racing to introduce the Bible (and refined sugar) to indigenous people who were doing just fine without either… (“Get me some repressive sexual mores in here! Stat!”)

None of that activity has any relationship to the talent or the light that Milton has described as his offering, his sense of himself as a person in service to the sacred. It’s almost as if he is describing two different realms, or two different kinds of people.

They also serve who only stand and wait.”

I am not sure where I am headed, and I don’t know how long the light will last. And frankly I’m sometimes afraid to stand and wait too long.

But John Milton and his friend, Patience, teach me that mindlessly rushing about doesn’t add time — it only subtracts energy.

So I’ll try to wait, like I’m supposed to.

Because Paradise is still ahead, to be lost, and then to be regained.

Note: An earlier version of this essay was posted in December 2017.