Angels Everywhere E-Book

Luci Shaw

• Herausgeber: Paraclete Press
• Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

"The word 'angel' means 'messenger' and the title poem of this book, 'Angels Everywhere,' presents the idea that what I often glimpse is a flicker of glancing light, as if a heavenly being is darting in and out of my viewing, allowing me entry into a realm beyond my physical, experiential world—brief revelatory messages from somewhere beyond. I'm hoping that as you read these poems, (more than once, aloud if possible) something like Wordsworth's 'intimations of immortality' will enliven your own perceptions of the world as you experience it. Maybe your own fleet of angels will show up!" —Luci Shaw, from the Introduction Angels Everywhere is published under Paraclete Press's Iron Pen imprint. In the book of Job, a suffering man pours out his anguish to his Maker. From the depths of his pain, he reveals a trust in God's goodness that is stronger than his despair, giving humanity some of the most beautiful and poetic verses of all time. Paraclete's Iron Pen imprint is inspired by this spirit of unvarnished honesty and tenacious hope.  

Leseprobe

ANGELS EVERYWHERE

POEMS

LUCI SHAW

2022 First Printing

Angels Everywhere: Poems

Copyright © 2022 by Luci Shaw

ISBN 978-1-64060-720-0

The Iron Pen name and logo are trademarks of Paraclete Press.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Shaw, Luci, author.

Title: Angels everywhere : poems / Luci Shaw.

Description: Brewster, Massachusetts : Iron Pen/Paraclete Press, [2022] | Summary: “Poetry written as if a heavenly being is darting in and out of viewing, bringing brief revelatory messages from somewhere beyond”--Provided by publisher.

Identifiers: LCCN 2021053565 (print) | LCCN 2021053566 (ebook) | ISBN 9781640607200 (trade paperback) | ISBN 9781640607217 (epub) | ISBN 9781640607224 (pdf)

Subjects: BISAC: POETRY / Subjects & Themes / Inspirational & Religious | LCGFT: Poetry.

Classification: LCC PS3569.H384 A82 2022 (print) | LCC PS3569.H384 (ebook) | DDC 811/.54--dc23/eng/20211029

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021053565

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021053566

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All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in an electronic retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other—except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.

Published by Paraclete Press

Brewster, Massachusetts

www.paracletepress.com

Printed in the United States of America

For some of the angels in my life:

Jennie, Claudia, Deb, Laurie, Doreen

ALSO BY LUCI SHAW

POETRY

Listen to the Green

The Secret Trees

Postcard from the Shore

Polishing the Petoskey Stone

Writing the River

The Angles of Light

The Green Earth

Waterlines

What the Light Was Like

Harvesting Fog

Scape

Eye of the Beholder

The Generosity

FOR CHILDREN

The Genesis of It All

The O in Hope

WITH MADELEINE L’ENGLE

Wintersong

A Prayerbook for Spiritual Friends

Friends for the Journey

NONFICTION

God in the Dark

Water My Soul

The Crime of Living Cautiously

Adventure of Ascent

The Thumbprint in the Clay

CONTENTS

FOREWORD

ANGELS EVERYWHERE

PART IOUT OF DARKNESS

CONSIDERATIONS

GAZE

PREY

BONES

THE SENSE OF LANGUAGE

EMBRYO

QUESTIONS IN TIME OF PESTILENCE

PERSISTENCE

VOYAGE

DIURNAL

ENABLED

SONGS IN A STRANGE LAND

HOPE THAT GLIMMERS

WHAT I HOPE

EVENING PSALM

MOONRISE

CHIAROSCURO

NIGHT WATCH

SORROW

QUARANTINE

PART IITHROUGH SHADOW

HALOS

IMMERSION

A PRAYER LIKE LACE

MY FATHER’S NOTES

WHEN YOUR FATHER DIES

EMILY’S VIRTUES

METAMORPHOSIS

RELEASE

LITTLE REVELATIONS

SANTA FE EVENING

PART IIIINTO LIGHT

GOD’S BIG HAND

A WISH IN THE WIND

SEEDHEED

VEGETABLE PATCH

KNITTING THE FIELDS

APRIL

SPRING ON KING MOUNTAIN

MEMBER, REMEMBER

MAY

FIRST DAY OF SUMMER

JAM

THE RIPENING

A SIMPLE SERVICE

JESUS WRITES A POEM

IN THE BEGINNING, A WORD

SOME POEMS SEEM

KINSHIP

AUGUST ARRIVAL

WINGS

BIRD WOMAN

WHAT TO LISTEN FOR

THE MANY, THE ONE

SEPTEMBER

COUNTRY ROAD

LEAVING

THE LANDSCAPE SPEAKS

TO WEST BEACH, LUMMI ISLAND

IN PRAISE OF MY LEFT ANKLE

THERE AND BACK

DRIVING WEST

THE PANG OF RECOLLECTION

REMINDERS

OLD STONES

LAST NIGHT’S RAIN

SHAKER CHAIR

SUN SHAWL

RECOVERY

NOTES FROM A SUNDAY SERMON

SARAH LAUGHS AGAIN

PARTURITION

DAY BOOK

PLENITUDE

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

FOREWORD

In a recent issue of National Geographic I read the comment: “Hope lies in the very nature of travel.” We have proven this true during the long, restricted years and months of the pandemic when we have had no idea when the darkness of anxiety and isolation will wane and the light of health and freedom return. My husband, John, and I live alone, and for safety’s sake we’ve remained for a very long time masked and at arms-length from our friends, and our loving children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, some of whom have grown up and still live near us in Bellingham, Washington, our hometown. It was as if the sun of love and companionship had been shut out.

I read recently, too, in a book review about the difficulty of living with restrictions, that “Days feel long and months feel short.” This is the kind of disorientation that has infected us like a plague, during the uncertain epidemic. And while, during those days, it has been unwise for us to board a plane or a cruise ship, a proven way for us to vary the monotony of the house-bound, to feel free, no matter the season, was to jump in our Subaru Outback and explore the almost infinite variety of highways and byways around our home, just south of the Canadian border. We live in Whatcom County, Washington, just north of Skagit County. Both of these regions are dotted with mountains, lakes, delta flatlands and farmlands, and just west of our home is glorious, islanded Puget Sound. From our west-facing windows up on our hill we are blessed with displays of magnificent sunsets over Bellingham Bay.

In the fall and winter, our forest trees are bathed in cold, damp fogs from the ocean, until limbs and branches, like old ladies and gentlemen, wear coats of emerald mosses and ferns like rich vegetable fur. We pay close attention to the shifts and changes of each month. We notice how, as light slowly returns and the weather warms from winter to spring, twigs and buds on branches thicken incrementally and sprout their rudimentary leaves. Along our streets the tree branches begin to look like lace as they thicken with new growth. I am particularly excited to feel myself a part of this renewal (see “Spring on King Mountain,” p. 58). The fresh greens of spring, so innocent and brave, are invitations for us to celebrate the resurgence in the cycle of natural life and light.

It’s these ordinary details that speak to me. How, for instance, the sun, so welcome after a long, dark winter, encourages new growing, an emblem of our growth in God, in whom we live and move and have our being, and in whose light we grow and flourish. For those of us who have lived through so many years of human experience this is a lesson we can still learn and live into. All of our magnificent creation responds to the sun’s encouraging light.

In spring, as that light grows, we notice the resurgence of the intrepid, homely beauty of flowers and roadside weeds, fresh from the Creator’s mind, including dandelions (see “A Wish in the Wind,” p. 53). Summer’s heat and light promote the growth of saplings and the long grasses along the verges of the roads. The farmers’ fields are rich with growing crops.