Desolation is a specific word in the contemplative tradition, distinct from ordinary sadness. It names the experience of a soul that once felt God’s nearness and now feels only His seeming absence. This sonnet stands inside that experience honestly, and asks what remains when the felt presence is gone.
The Sonnet
I called this morning as I always called, And heard no answer where I once heard sound, The room that used to hold me, unappalled, Feels empty now, an echo with no ground. I do not say that You are truly gone, I know the creeds, I know the ancient claim, But knowing does not warm this present dawn, Nor does it always steady what I name. And still I choose to speak into this hush, To call again though nothing seems to stir, For faith is not the warmth, the felt-near rush, But the will that keeps on calling, keeps on there. So I will call into the seeming void, And trust the calling is not lost or void.
Reflection
Desolation, in the language of the contemplatives, is the experience of a soul that has known the nearness of God and now, for a season, feels only absence. It is different from doubt about whether God exists. It is the harder experience of believing He exists and feeling, nonetheless, that He has withdrawn.
This is one of the most disorienting experiences in the spiritual life, especially for those who have known real intimacy with God before. The teaching of the saints through the centuries is consistent, that desolation is not necessarily a sign of God’s true absence, but often a season allowed for the deepening of trust beyond what feeling alone can sustain. The soul that keeps calling, even into apparent silence, is not abandoned. It is being formed.
If God feels absent to you right now, keep calling anyway. The saints who walked this same desolation and kept calling found, often much later, that they had not been calling into an empty room after all.
