Birthdays

It's the birthday of St. John of the Cross, born in Hontiveros, Spain (1542), the patron saint of mystics, contemplatives, and Spanish poets. He grew up in poverty — his father having given up his noble birth to marry a peasant girl. His father died when he was young, and he worked at a hospital for the poor to help earn money for his mother. Along with St. Teresa of Ávila, he worked to reform the Carmelite order. He was arrested for his attempts at reform, and he was treated brutally, given a public lashing once a week. But he wrote some of his best poetry while he was imprisoned. He managed to escape, and continued to work on Church reform and to write poetry, and even today he is considered one of Spain's greatest poets, with poems likeSpiritual Canticle and Dark Night of the Soul.

It's the birthday of essayist and short-story writer Ambrose Bierce (books by this author), born near Horse Cave Creek, Ohio (1842). He became the second person in his county to volunteer for the Union Army at the outbreak of the Civil War.
He wrote bleak short stories about the Civil War, his most famous is "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge," about a spy condemned to die by hanging, only to escape when the rope snaps. He runs through the forest, away from enemy gunfire, and eventually finds his home plantation, and is about to embrace his wife when he feels a blow on his neck, and it turns out the whole escape was a daydream in the split second before his death.