As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth: it will not return to me [...]
Archive for the ‘The Reading Journals’ Category
Words from Isaiah, the Poet-Prophet
Posted in The Daily Poems, The Reading Journals, tagged all the trees of the field (song), first lesson for 10 July 2011, Isaiah, juniper, liturgical readings, myrtle, poet-prophet on July 10, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
Signs of Hope
Posted in The Reading Journals, tagged " Jane Beal, blue hydrangea, Genesis, Isaac and Rebecca, Rivka, sermon, signs of hope, Yitzak on July 5, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
“Signs of Hope“ A sermon by Jane Beal on Genesis 24 The Story of Yitzhak & Rivka blue hydrangea
Buffalo Dance: The Journey of York by Frank X. Walker
Posted in The Daily Poems, The Reading Journals, tagged Afrilachian poets, black magic, Buffalo dance, Frank X. Walker, her current, Lewis and Clark, ornithologists, Sacajawea, the journey of York on July 1, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
Not many weeks ago, I found one of the most admirable collection of poems I’ve ever read: Frank X. Walker’s Buffalo Dance: The Journey of York. York was a man and a body servant enslaved by William Clark of the William and Clark expedition, and he went with the expedition into the West. In Buffalo Dance, [...]
Thinking in Haibun
Posted in A Poet's Education, The Reading Journals, tagged Aimee Nezhukumatahil, haibun, The Artist's Way on June 27, 2011 | 1 Comment »
I recently finished a collection of haibun, called Wild Birdsong, which will soon be in print – so I was delighted to open American Poet: The Journal of the Academy of American Poets (Spring 2011) to read Aimee Nezhukumatahil‘s essay, “More Than the Birds, Bees and Trees: A Closer Look at Writing Haibun.” Her essay is poetry in [...]
RezArtists Respond to the Story of the Blind Man
Posted in The Reading Journals, tagged Church of the Rez, Jesus, John 9:1-38, RezArtists, the man born blind on April 8, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
In the gospel of John 9:1-38, we can read the story of the way Jesus miraculously healed the man born blind. It’s an astonishing story, really. For Lent, my RezArtists’ group was asked to respond with artwork — visual & lyrical — to this story. We did. To see the results, visit the RezBlog on the [...]
Traveling with Pomegranates
Posted in The Daily Poems, The Reading Journals, tagged Ann Kidd Taylor, Mary Sarton, Secret Life of Bees, Sue Monk Kidd, Traveling with Pomegranates, When a Woman Feels Alone on January 9, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
I celebrated Epiphany by visiting the Rancho Palos Verdes Peninsula — watching birds by the coast and whales in the water spouting and turning up their flukes — with my dear pregnant friend Vivian (the lively one, the one-full-of-life!). On my flight back from Los Angeles, I started reading Traveling with Pomegranates. It’s a travel [...]
Queen Elizabeth I’s Morning Prayer
Posted in The Reading Journals, tagged morning prayer, Queen Elizabeth I on December 23, 2010 | Leave a Comment »
“My God, my Father, and my Savior, as Thou now sendest Thy sun upon the earth to give corporeal light to Thy creatures, vouchsafe also to illumine my heart and understanding by the heavenly light of Thy Holy Spirit, that I neither think nor say nor do anything unless to serve and please Thee. During [...]
Dune Poems
Posted in The Daily Poems, The Reading Journals, tagged Brian Herbert, Children of Dune, Dreamer of Dune, Dune, ecology, Frank Herbert, haiku, Jesus, Litany Against Fear, Parable of the Wheat and the Tares, psychology, Roman Catholicism, Songs of Maud'dib on December 21, 2010 | 1 Comment »
I discovered the Dune series, the most popular and influential ecological science-fiction books ever written, before I was eleven. I read them all, and even as a child, I wanted to meet Frank Herbert. He died in 1986, but I didn’t know until I was a teenager. Meanwhile, I went on admiring the personal psychology [...]
The Forgetting Room
Posted in The Reading Journals, tagged Armon Hurtago, Nick Bantock, painting, Spain, The Forgetting Room on November 16, 2010 | 1 Comment »
Last year, I went on a pilgrimage to Spain, visiting five cities: Madrid, Toledo, Avila, León, and Santiago de Compostela. It was the last of three amazing journeys I took; on the others, I visited Rome and Jerusalem. But Spain was special to me. Recently, I sat reading Nick Bantock’s book, The Forgetting Room. It [...]
The Snow Queen
Posted in The Reading Journals on November 14, 2010 | 2 Comments »
I feel like I have been living with the Snow Queen for most of my life. I first met her in Narnia when she kidnapped Edmund, and I didn’t like her much. Her name was Jadis, and she was known as the White Witch. Later, I met her in a science-fiction novel by Joan D. [...]
