• Poetry

    Too Wide, Too Wonderful

    The Writer’s Blood in my fountain penmakes me question my worthiness.But when have I ever believed I was worthy? After all, I grew up in a world of wordsdescended from the litigious Latin language,which allows no dissent from the sentence…

  • Thoughts

    The Essence is the Goal

    You tell your story over and over until you find the words and the listener that make everything click. Inspiration works that way, too. Over the years, artist Valda Bailey has provided lots of it, so it should be no…

  • Thoughts

    Silent War

    I have been engaged in a war since birth, as has each and every one of you. I bet you didn’t know that. Don’t feel bad; neither did I. The enemy is good. It has endless resources, recruits, and weapons…

  • Thoughts

    Do You Speak a Dead Language?

    “The source of life which you create lies in the power of the language which you have.” —Christopher Alexander, The Timeless Way of Building How many of us think about and analyze the language we have—the one we were given…

  • Thoughts

    Out in the Cold

    C.S. Lewis retells the myth of Cupid and Psyche in his powerful novel Till We Have Faces. This is my second reading of the book, and everything’s different for me now that I’ve moved my starting point and see clearly…

  • Thoughts

    Where Does One Begin?

    Now, it is no longer a child who is going to tell this story and that is regrettable. It is a man. Worse yet, it is the university professor I have become. I will have to guard myself very carefully…

  • Thoughts

    Daring Despite the Danger

    “The known, our current story, protects us from the unknown, from chaos—which is to say, provides our experience with determinate and predictable structure. … When we are in the domain of the known, so to speak, there is no reason…

  • Thoughts

    A Madeleine Day

    Will I ever retire Walking on Water: just leave it alone or give it away? I doubt it. It continues to speak to me, even though I would never think to include L’Engle in a list of my favorite writers.…

  • Thoughts

    Who Do You Serve?

    Father Anthony Giambrone, O.P. wrote a Magnificat essay about Peter’s shadow, which just so happened to heal those thronging about him after Jesus’ death and resurrection. Our monthly guide through the more whimsical elements of the Bible acknowledges folklore motifs…

  • Thoughts

    How Absolute?

    Two chapters a day is my quota for War and Peace. It’s possible that I will make it more of a priority at some point, but for now, I am content with my pace and have been pleasantly surprised by…