Tag: poetry

When the Sun Was a Poet: A New Chapter

“Poetry is not a luxury. It is a vital necessity of our existence.”
— Audre Lorde

Somewhere along the arc of my teaching and writing life, poetry moved from the edges of my academic work to the center of it. It didn’t happen all at once. But as I wrote more poetry and discovered its connection to my teaching and scholarly life, I one day found myself no longer just writing poems but living as a poet. A poetic theologian.

Today, I’m excited to share that my poetry collection, When the Sun Was a Poet: A Lyrical Almanac of Life’s Seasons and Seasonings, has been published by Kelsay Books, and is now available through both Kelsay and Amazon.

This is my first poetry book to be accepted by a publisher. My earlier collections were self-published, labors of love, offered from a place of conviction and care. I embrace this book is a turning point, not because it matters more, but because it marks a kind of affirmation, an affirmation of voice, of craft, of calling.

Poetic Theology, Seasoned

When the Sun Was a Poet is a thread woven through my new understanding of myself as a poetic theologian. The book reflects a way of listening to time, memory, body, ritual, and breath. The poems follow the shape of a year, with its solstices and harvests, its cold bones and blooming springtimes. The poems are rooted in the quiet power of seasons, both liturgical and lived.

For me, poetic theology is not only about writing poems that reflect faith or spirituality. It’s about practicing theology through the language of image, silence, and metaphor. It’s about bearing witness to the sacred in ordinary rhythms. It’s about holding joy and grief in the same weathered hand.

This book is an offering shaped by those convictions.

A Threshold of Gratitude

You can now order When the Sun Was a Poet here:

I’m so grateful to Kelsay Books for this opportunity, and to everyone who has supported my journey into poetic theology. Your encouragement, your listening, your witness—these are the real affirmations.

Blessings,
Jill

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She, Created by the Creating One

I wrote the poem below on the occasion of my mother’s death. She often sewed through the night to complete a piece of clothing for me to wear to school the next day—that morning. Looking now on her work through those nights, I glimpse something about God’s creative work on behalf of those in our midst who with determination and courage clothe themselves in God’s love and grace.

Burning Midnight Oil

A solitary light beaconed from the distance
in the wee hours just before
dawn cracked open the darkness.

Burning the midnight oil.

The Creating One in the beginning of beginnings
—sewing and seaming, stitching
roots into the earth, fashioning fine 
spring things to adorn bluebirds and bumblebees
daffodils and dandelions, embroidering soulful
soil with a smile and breathing into it a 
sigh of delight. 

Burning the midnight oil.

A solitary light beaconed from another window  
in the wee hours just before 
dawn cracked open the darkness.

Burning the midnight oil.

She, created by the Creating One
–whirring and chirring, snipping and clipping,
weary-wise fingers urging one more scrap
of this bit of blue, that piece of red
beneath the ever-marching
needle-foot of that old Singer Sewer
Model 301A she kept coaxing and
cajoling into action one more time
to fashion an Easter dress or a pair
of jeans or, one time, a man’s leisure suit.

Burning the midnight oil.

All other eyes in the house, on the street, shuttered tight
while she followed with single-hearted gaze
thread that danced and dipped beneath the
material surface, not noticing the
pale winter moon kissing her hand
as the clock ticked on until she sat back
and embroidered into a girl’s last minute
request a tired sigh of delight.

Burning the midnight oil.

A light beckons; vital 
sacred strands spool on at the unfurling edge 
of a new crack in a resurrecting dawn, fervent
fibers holding us together
—held in our hands—
you and I piecing together hope from
torn and tearing hearts, called by the 
Creating One.

Burn the midnight oil.