A New Creation Poem Remember that at one time you were a howling wilderness, the haunt of hyenas who cackled among the thistles under a ghost moon. But now in Christ Jesus you are a fresh spring, cooling the rocks and watering the hills that roll under a young sun.
We stood at my grandma Karen’s grave on Palm Sunday, the wind matting the grass and making all the fake grave flowers tremble. Dad brought a bundle of daffodils from Papa Larry’s garden, and as he tucked them in the granite vase, I said I hoped they wouldn’t blow away. But it’s early April and … Continue reading Grave Flowers
Lila Joy was born at home a week ago, all healthy and ruddy and dark-headed. I went for a visit Tuesday afternoon, and she was curled near my sister in a patch of sunlight on the bed, not so swollen as she'd been fresh out of the womb. It had been dark then, and the … Continue reading Looking for Some Light
A Story of Christmas Yet To Come Race Point is the easternmost I’ve ever been— in fact, it’s just about as eastward as you can get in the States, at the fingertip of Massachusetts’s arm. It was a strange thing to stand with all North America behind me, to face the horizon of sea, to … Continue reading Look East
A Story of Christmas Past My grandma Karen watched Hallmark Christmas movies the way some people use an Advent wall calendar. She counted down to Christmas that way, settling into the couch every evening for the newest feature with the same cookie-cutter plotline as the night before; and she wanted us to relish them too. … Continue reading All Shall Be Well
May you wake to a cracked window and rain that started in the night. Before you get elbow-deep into your work, may you get ankle-deep in leaves. Poet or builder, pastor or mother—may you welcome the cooler air by being in it. May you take a walk and need a jacket, and hear the geese … Continue reading An October Blessing
My favorite part of Fritz’s funeral was when his friends got up to tell stories about him--- how he got locked inside the city dump once, how he ate breakfast at Wimpy’s diner every week, and how the waitresses kept a bottle of special syrup there just for him. Fritz was man with his eyes … Continue reading Fritz
It must have seemed like the worst time in the world to get pregnant, Pharoah’s reign. Her son would only be stolen away, screaming and hiccupping as newborns do, tossed over the banks of the Nile. So today, I’m thankful Moses’ mother gave birth anyway. I’m thankful she nursed him to keep him quiet and … Continue reading Daughters of Eve
By Esther Hartman and sometimes, sometimes, the shadow is married to the lightin a grand ceremony of temple curtains torn in two,and the welding of spark to suffering, of hideous to holy,and light keeps replacing bulbs in all dark’s hiding placeshoping he’ll finally see himselfand the great rivals called death and lifefind each other ravaged … Continue reading The Great Opposites
The swing set oak is forty years old — taller than our maples, cedars, even its pin oak siblings. Mr. Adams planted it when our neighborhood was still his field and my mom was a kid who ran through it. Planting a tree is always an act of faith, but it’s also a selfless thing … Continue reading By Faith, Plant Sequoias
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