Gerard Manley Hopkins. John Donne. Wm. Shakespeare. Christina Rosetti. Emily Dickinson. Paul Simon. Bono. Since I was a very young lad growing up in Calgary, Canada, I’ve had a love affair with language; specifically the art of words. Words spoken. Words written. Words read and re-read, like ingesting food for the eyes that gets digested in the heart. In the holistic sense of the term, words are sensual. They are meant for more than simply corralling ideas or channelling information. They can and should be beautiful for their own sake. Carefully chosen and meted out in gradual succession like adding the correct ingredients in proper order to the perfect meal, words are part of the whole and greater than the sum of their parts. They massage meaning into our spiritual skin, perking up our inner ears to hear what our unseen lover whispers in our unguarded moments.

The Christian life is more poetry than prose; more a wild garden than suburban lawn. To that end I share this brief poem:

am

Day kisses night

on its way to dawn,

soon to draw her droplets

of dew, the sap of hope lain low

on earth’s misty treasure.

Morning meets hollow,

Sullen, soaked in the sallow,

dimpled winter, Spring

taps impatiently her shoulder

cold, but waiting, back turned

to face of the new.

I sit

Sit with her in hard patience

Awaiting promise of ante-meridian

Resurrection.