Search Results for: the writer

“But how can they believe me? When sometimes I don’t even believe myself. Maybe it’s time to be loud.” No strong poem is ordinary;  Maria’s surely is not ordinary either.  I am proud that the “Work Day in Hard Times” … Continue reading →

Today’s Post – – Wendell Berry Fellowship of Southern Writers It may be that when we no longer know what to do we have come to our real work, and that when we no longer know which way to go … Continue reading →

Monday May 18 – “Let no one touch this gentle sun  —   In whose dark eye  —  Someone is awake.” Five years ago, a weekly selection of 7 poems, from “A Year of Being Here,” confronted me with a short … Continue reading →

Wednesday, May 6, 2020 —  Nurse as Miracle Worker “From a great distance, gaze but do not know Why they are glad to see me come and go.” In his 2014 Writer’s Almanac, Garrison Keillor introduced me to Mary Borden, a … Continue reading →

“There is no way of telling people that they are all walking around shining like the sun.” Thomas Merton A Birthday Note to My Sister Good morning, Mary.  I chose this amazing sentence from Thomas Merton for your birthday.   … Continue reading →

Wednesday, April 8, 2020   During these demanding times the Work Day/Hard Times List has been receiving more poems than usual.   Their authors are women and men, adults and children.  They risk fresh language that often surprises us as … Continue reading →

Dec 21 shortest daylight = solstice Saturday, December 21  –  O Oriens At Detroit’s latitude we will have 9 hours and 3 minutes of daylight, 14 hours and 57 minutes of night time. Our shortest day. Today’s O Antiphon, “O … Continue reading →

Thursday,  December 19 Today’s Antiphon, “O Root of Jesse,” grew out of two Biblical texts recounting the genealogy of Jesus (Luke 3:23 and Matthew 1:1).  Both versions locate the new born baby as Jesus, a human being, more than as … Continue reading →

Friday, August 9, 2019 This Friday recalls Friday May 31 – when the Poetry List went on summer break.   Together with last Monday’s Mary Oliver voice, Thomas Merton opens week one with the same words with which he concluded … Continue reading →

Friday, May 31  –  Thomas Merton “Let no one touch this gentle sun  — In whose dark eye  — Someone is awake.” For this last poem of the academic year, I looked back to May of 2015 for a strong … Continue reading →