Peace by Gerard Manley Hopkins When will you ever, Peace, wild wooddove, shy wings shut, Your round me roaming end, and under be my boughs? When, when, Peace, will you, Peace? I’ll not play hypocrite To own my heart: I yield you do come...
Portrait of a Figure Near Water by Jane Kenyon Rebuked, she turned and ran uphill to the barn. Anger, the inner arsonist, held a match to her brain. She observed her life: against her will it survived the unwavering flame. The barn was empty of...
A poem by one of my favorite poets, Seamus Heaney that commemorates his first walk with the woman who would become his wife. Although the poem clearly describes a cityscape, with hushed traffic, and a modern couple, I really liked this image of...
You Begin by Margaret Atwood You begin this way: this is your hand, this is your eye, that is a fish, blue and flat on the paper, almost the shape of an eye. This is your mouth, this is an O or a moon, whichever you like. This is yellow. Outside the...
Cause of Our Joy by Anne Porter Rock crystal Clearer than crystal Stronger than rock Snow crown of Sinai Melting on the heights Pouring through the valleys In pure rushing water And wine that sings of justice. * * * Chose from the chosen Mystical...
Both of these, the painting and the poem, make me happy. I wish I had more moments like this, the house empty, the world calm, losing myself in a book. It doesn’t seem to happen so very often these days. Like Stevens’ reader I long to be...
In the care package they sent for Epiphany my parents included a packet of postcards they had found in a box in the attic. There was a packet of cards from the Sistine Chapel in a Vatican Museum bag, a set of Marc Chagall postcards, and a set of Van...
1. Frost on the roof of Dom’s car. He says the timing was just right. The sun had just peeked over the roof of my minivan, making the frost shine, and a minute later the frost had started to melt. 2. Lucia and Daddy cuddling at bedtime. she...
Conversions are as strange and individual as the people who experience them. Some transformations, weighted with drama, are Damascus road affairs that defy reason, but others come quietly after puzzles and questions, self-conscious searching, years...
My friend Nicole introduced me to Richard Katrovas, who was her teacher. I thought this take on Hopkins was interesting. Grieving for Hopkins Margaret, behind you is someone whose heart churns slowly as decay. Eve in “grieving” and “unleaving” is...
