The Animals in Our Lives

About four-hundred years ago, John Donne wrote a poem entitled “The Flea,” and over two-hundred years ago, “The Tyger” by William Blake was published. Both poems had to do with encountering various forms of nature in our lives. However, “The Flea” had more to do with the nature of marriage and “The Tyger” with the nature of God.

 

In the Introduction to The Animals in Our Lives, editor-writer-publisher Catherine Lawton offers this insight:

 

“Sometimes animals are mirrors for us to see ourselves more clearly.”

 

She also reminds us:

 

• Animals are our fellow creatures, loved by the Creator.
• Animals can provide companionship, inspiration, and comfort.
• Animals can teach us about the Creator and how to relate to God.
• Animals provide metaphors of our lives that help us understand ourselves.
• Animals (especially those in the wild) represent elements of Mystery.

 

In these turbulent, often scary, times, directing our attention onto animals of all kinds gives us a positive focus that helps us to realign with God’s prayer for all peoples to take care of the earth.

Published by Cladach Publishing, who kindly sent me a writer’s copy, this new anthology can help us to regain our perspective, our commitment, and our hope through the essays, stories, and poems about engaging with animals from these diverse categories:

 

Our Dogs – from show dogs to trained therapists

Our Cats – from strays to guardian angels

Our Farm Animals – from sheep to prayer circles of cows

Our Unusual Pets – from crickets and honeybees to hedgehogs and reptiles

Our Wild Animal Encounters – from dolphins to bears and elks to owls

 

What a special showcase of creatures, great and small! May God help us to take care of them and remind us how they take care of us.

 

 

©2021, Mary Harwell Sayler, reviewer, poet-writer of PRAISE! published by Cladach Publishing

 

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Glimpsing Glory

Poet, writer, editor, and publisher Catherine Lawton’s second book of poems, Glimpsing Glory, shows a love of God and appreciation for nature, rhyme, contemplation, and prayer.

As the daughter of a pastor, she learned to adjust to new surroundings in a series of moves and, as a wife and mother, enjoyed family outings in natural terrains – all of which can be glimpsed in the poems she writes. In other genres, her articles, stories, and books saw publication, and now, as the editor and publisher of Cladach Publishing, she publishes works by other poets and writers, including my book of poems and contemporary psalms, PRAISE!

In organizing her new book Glimpsing Glory, which Cathy kindly sent me to review, she divided her poems and prayers into seven sections: Relating, Communing, Trusting, Living, Dying, Praying, and Word-Playing – each of which offers some glimpse of glory.

To clarify her theme, she poses the question, “What do I mean by ‘glory’?” in the first line of the first poem with the poem itself a response. For instance:

The Shekinah glory filled the temple.

Our bodies are temples.

The next poem, “Spaces Between,” gives a glimpse of the “God-centered contemplative life” the poet seeks for herself while inviting readers to stop and notice:

The spaces between things seem

to take on lives of their own.

In “The Stars Sing,” the poet pauses to take in the sweep of night sky, which she describes:

Like music engraved, blazoned across the sky,

notes – not in lined scores or measures,

but in splashes of compositions ears and eyes

aren’t attuned to hear or decipher.

Not with physical ears do I hear the music

of stars singing out from night pavilion,

graced by the moon, echoed by bugling elk,

crooning owls and sibilant wind.

The poems continue to observe and encourage observation. For instance, in “Nature Doesn’t Lie,” the poet counsels readers:

Be present to a flower, tree, or pond;

it will gradually

be present

to you in truth.

Truth comes into focus again in the poetic prayer “Wholeness and Peace,” which begins:

Lord, I don’t want to live out of

a place formed by other people’s

brokenness, false words spoken

over me, lies internalized, nor fears.

Then goes on to say:

Speak Truth in this awakened  place.

I open doors, windows, pull down

storm shutters, plank by plank,

that your Light may stream in.

May we, too, be called to Glory!

Mary Harwell Sayler, ©2020

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Take a poem to lunch

Have you read any delicious poems lately? You can recognize them by their crisp images and yummy words.

Similar to vitamins and minerals needed to replenish weary body cells, poems can replace junk-food thoughts with revitalizing nutrients for the body, mind, and soul.

A problem comes, however, in trying to find appealing poems to devour. Many of them go on and on with nothing new to give those of us who want more than empty calories or rehashed left-overs. Some poems make us turn up our noses at their saccharine sweetness while others seem gross enough to make us gag!

Poems need to be smooth, edible, and not stick in the throat.

Poems need texture, salt, spice, and a colorful garnish.

Poems need to be more melodic than a dinner bell.

As a lifelong lover of poetry, I’ve had the joy of sampling poems with enough variety for almost any taste. A couple of years ago, I wrote about some of those recommendations in “Favorite poets, poetry, and why.” Since then, new works have come to my attention as review copies arrived from poetry book publishers. I’ve undoubtedly missed many, but the following links can help to expand your versatile menu for a healthy, creative life of poetry:

Poetry by some of my favorite poets:

The Life and Death of Poetry: poems by Kelly Cherry

Idiot Psalms by Scott Cairns

Songs from a Wild Place and Estuaries by Jason Kirkey

Eyes Have I That See by priest-poet John Julian

Remembering Softly: a life in poems by Catherine Lawton

Anthologies with works by many poets:

St. Peter’s B-List, anthology

The Paraclete Poetry Anthology

The Seashell Anthology of Great Poetry


Reviews by poet-author Mary Harwell Sayler
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Remembering Softly: a life in poems

In this age of slung mud and cynicism, what a joy to receive the refreshing book, Remembering Softly: a life in poems by Catherine Lawton, published by Cladach Publishing, who kindly sent me a copy for review.

The back of the softly colorful cover let me know that Catherine and I began writing poetry about the same age, which makes me suspect she also loves the play of sounds and words. More important, her poetry comes from the spirit with a heart for life and the Divine.

As her opening quote from Romans 12:1 suggests, she writes “With eyes wide open to the mercies of God.” Then, in the Introduction, the poet gives a glimpse of her writing process, which I recognize and highly recommend. She says:

“Admittedly, I am not a disciplined poet. I can compose meter and rhyme on demand; but mostly I wait for that elusive and mysterious inspiration. The important thing is to capture on paper the phrases, images, and insights as they come; to sit with them, savor them, polish them like agates; and if they pass the test of holding together and ringing true, to share them.”

…which reminds me to say that a major aspect of writing poetry is being hospitable! i.e., As a line, image, or musical phrase comes, the immediate task is to give that opening full attention. Then the rest of the poem will often follow.

That sense of hospitality and keen awareness of the present moment develops in reverse order, chronologically, as the book begins with current times and goes back to earlier poems. Even then, an appreciation of life apparently began in childhood as the last poem in the book nicely demonstrates.

In “It’s a Beautiful Day,” the child-poet wrote:

"The robins sing.
And the roosters crow.
The rising sun warms
The valley below."

With the same time of day and observant eye but greater complexity, the poet begins the book with “In the Cleft of a Cold, White Rock,” written earlier this year:

“As in the close space
between dawn and dusk
of a January day when
hoar-frosted trees
have their feet in snow
and their branches
raised against a white,
weighty sky, a crevice
of blue breaks and
frosted arms sparkle;
I find myself pressed between granite slabs….”

The press between the visual and the spiritual continues in “Snow on Good Friday” where flakes fall “like manna fallen from Heaven” while, in “God’s Anvil”…

“the church
re-awakens
to purity
power
love.”

Oh, what a blessing that would be!

The hopes and prayers of a life given to love come through strongly in this book, but fresh scenes also draw us back to the visual. In “Autumn Walk Along the Poudre River,” for example:

“I see kingfisher, yellow-legs, bright magpie;
hear squirrels chatter, red-tails scream,
and splashing fish in sparkling stream.”

Besides noting designs in nature, the poet included the light and lively artwork of her granddaughters Isabelle Lawton and Breanna Slike, bringing yet another lovely touch to this book.

Review by Mary Harwell Sayler, poet-writer reviewer, © 2016


Remembering Softly: a life in poems, paperback


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