An Exercise in Frivolity

     One of the things I resort to when going through a poetical low patch (euphemism for "writer's block") is writing lyrics to well-known tunes. It amuses me and keeps my meter/rhyme muscles in shape. I was called upon several times to use this skill, if you can call it that, when I was in the monastery -- e. g., for our novice directress' feast day one year, I wrote funny lyrics to the Brady Bunch theme, and all the novices sang it for her at recreation. We were a big hit. My "crowning achievement" (*snort*) was a little musical in eight vignettes about a young woman who enters the monastery and has to face a family dilemma just before her clothing day. That is, I wrote the book and lyrics, but the music for all the songs was, shall we say, appropriated from The Sound of Music. I had hoped that we, the novices, could perform it on the next St. Louis Bertram celebration (he's the patron saint of novices and novice directors), but, alas, it was not to be.
     One of the songs is about a struggle every postulant goes through -- learning to use the breviary. For those who don't know, the breviary is the book used every single day, several times a day, by ordained/vowed religious for praying the Liturgy of the Hours (also called the Divine Office), either together as a community, or in individual recitation. The common pronunciation, in America at least, is "bree-vree." Yes, the dictionary says otherwise, but for some reason I've always heard it "bree-vree," so that's how I say it, too. Anyway, learning how to use the breviary is a tortured process; hopefully, as a postulant, you are guided through it daily by your "angel," an older novice assigned to help you with all the practical aspects of monastic life.
     So here is my song about learning to use the "bree-vree." It is to be sung to the tune "How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria?"


POSTULANT:  How do you solve a problem like the breviary?
     How do you figure where to go, and when?
     How do you find your way around the breviary?
     I think I have got it, and then I get lost again!
     Many a day my "angel" tries to help me,
     Many a time my neighbor lends a hand.
     How can I expect to pray, and trip all along the way?
     When will I ever reach the Promised Land?
     Oh, how do you solve a problem like the breviary?
     How can I ever hope to understand?

NOVICE MISTRESS:  When I entered, it is true, I was clueless just like you,
     And I never knew exactly where we were ...

PRIORESS:  "It gets easier," they said, but inside my muddled head
     The memorials and the feasts were all a blur!
     But at last there came a day when there shone a hopeful ray,
     And the tangled muddle vanished from my brain.

NOVICE MISTRESS:  Until then, you must expect --

POSTULANT:  -- to become a nervous wreck?

NOVICE MISTRESS:  It's a penance!

PRIORESS:  It's a challenge!

POSTULANT:  It's a pain!!!

ALL 3:  How do you solve a problem like the breviary?
     How do you figure where to go, and when?
     How do you find your way around the breviary?

POSTULANT:  I think I have got it --

PRIORESS:  -- and then you get lost --

POSTULANT:  -- again!

PRIORESS and NOVICE MISTRESS: 
     Many a day my "angel" tried to help me,
     Many a day my neighbor lent a hand.

POSTULANT:  How can I expect to pray, and trip all along the way?

PRIORESS:  When will you ever reach the Promised Land?

ALL 3:  Oh, how do you solve a problem like the breviary? ...

     (Sudden, long pause while the SIGN CHANGER enters, carrying a sign which she places on the easel. On it is written: "Tomorrow's Liturgy: Paul Miki and Companions - Memorial - Common of Several Martyrs." The POSTULANT reads it silently, emits an anguished groan, then continues singing:)

POSTULANT:  How can I ever hope to understand?