“Poetry may seem to be an indirect way of speaking, but it’s more direct in touching the affective, relational part of us. It’s the language of the heart for those who have ears to hear. It’s especially valuable to read Christian poetry.”– D.S. Martin, in a 2024 Faith Today interview D.S. Martin’s latest book, The…
It’s hard to write about someone who should be well known – who is well known within a narrow tribe of Christian artists – but whose name draws blank stares from most who hear it. It is my privilege, then, to celebrate with you (or introduce you to) the life and work of Luci Shaw….
“Ave, ave,” soar the stereo boy-voicesas I hang the blue-robed Virgenand her naked Niñofrom the top of the tree.A cubit below the fatherless Holy Family, I tethertheir tin burro to a branch.The mother and child are all of a piece,a single piece of cutout hammered metalwrought by the peasant handsand fingers of the Oaxaca women’s…
At St. Patrick’s church, downtown,where Homeless Jesussleeps on a park bench at the corner,they handed outtheir one millionth free mealto Robert, who was next in line.He’s been coming for ten years. It started with sandwichespassed through the living room windowof the rectory, and graduatedto breakfast and a hot lunch, madein a state-of-the-art kitchen,newly set up in the school next door,using…
It has been a long timesince Grandpa Abu Ibrahim passed away.His fading image haunts me from time to time: A native of the holy land, dark-skinned, broad-lined forehead, hair invaded by age, youth’s black edges neatly combed backwards, not very thick, skin like a desert covered by zig-zag lines of bare sand, liquid eyes as green as virgin olives not ripe for…
In the beginning was the Word.Before the book, even before language,there was the Word. A calling, inviting, creating,ordering and blessing Word.A Word born of a divine lovethat overflows into all of creation,saturating all things with that love.The Word of the Creator did not return empty. A generative Word. And the Word gave birth to more words.Words…
Poetry in Place is a collection of attention. This anthology, edited by Deborah Bowen and Noah Van Brenk, brings together a wide diversity of poetic voices, each reflecting on their experiences of one small region of Southern Ontario. Imagined as “the land between the waters,” this area between Lake Ontario and the Grand River, west…
Doing the night checkon a mild September night –cattle all comfortable and content,kittens still playing.They will settle down after lights out. Jupiter and Saturn towards the south,high in a moonlit sky.To the east, there, just abovethe silhouette of trees, the moon.Bright and two days past full,tonight she has a companion,a brilliant little dot – Mars!They…
I garden at 5:00 a.m.early morning, heavy dew why not pick some peascrisp pods some full some notpuzzled wife who thinks me nuts, a braille gardenerwho squats with God no accusation nowbut affirmation ‘what are you doing?’an approbation of the divine who thinks me no moreeccentric than he who walks the peasin the cool of…
My sister cares for her dying friend. /
Between chemo appointments /
they watch Netflix together . . .
Do they remember, that girl /
treading water in her cabin /
or the mother who held on /
for a long, last hour, praying /
until the tree itself gave way?
Of all the towns offered /
in the Italian countryside /
the weight carried /
by the star /
of Umbria /
casts the longest shadow.
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