Twenty Poems to Pray


Book Description

Drawing from the poetry of generations of esteemed writers Gary Bouchard shows how poems often express the longings of the human heart as a kind of prayer. Emily Dickinson, Rev. Rowan Williams, Pope John Paul II, Christina Rossetti, Robert Frost, and Fr. Kilian McDonnell, OSB, among others, offer readers an inspiring path to reflect upon and pray with poetic verse. Arranged under six engaging themes, each selection uses the words of poets as vehicles to prompt “heaven in ordinary” or to praise like “exalted manna”; to find the right “paraphrase” for your own soul or maybe sense your “soul’s blood”; to muster up from your grief or anger “reversed thunder” or dare to articulate from your own personal anguish “Christ-side-piercing spear.”




When Poets Pray


Book Description

Two dozen select prayer poems to learn from and live with Poetry and prayer are closely related. We often look to poets to give language to our deepest hopes, fears, losses—and prayers. Poets slow us down. They teach us to stop and go in before we go on. They play at the edges of mystery, holding a tension between line and sentence, between sense and reason, between the transcendent and the deeply, comfortingly familiar. When Poets Pray contains thoughtful meditations by Marilyn McEntyre on choice poems/prayers and poems about prayer. Her beautifully written reflections are contemplative exercises, not scholarly analyses, meant more as invitation than instruc¬tion. Here McEntyre shares gifts that she herself has received from poets who pray, or who reflect on prayer, believing that they have other gifts to offer readers seeking spiritual companionship along our pilgrim way. POETS DISCUSSED IN THIS BOOK Hildegard of Bingen Lucille Clifton Walter Chalmers Smith Robert Frost Wendell Berry Joy Harjo John Donne Gerard Manley Hopkins Said Marilyn McEntyre George Herbert Thomas Merton Denise Levertov Scott Cairns Mary Oliver Marin Sorescu T. S. Eliot Richard Wilbur Francisco X. Alarcon Anna Kamienska Michael Chitwood Psalm 139:1-12




Different Ways to Pray


Book Description




Prayers of a Young Poet


Book Description

This volume marks the first translation of these prayer-poems into English. Originally written in 1899, Rilke wrote them upon returning to Germany from his first trip to Russia. His experience of the East shaped him profoundly. He found himself entranced by Orthodox churches and monasteries, above all by the icons that seemed to him like flames glowing in dark spaces. He intended these poems as icons of sorts, gestures that could illumine a way for seekers in the darkness. As Rilke here writes, "I love the dark hours of my being, / for they deepen my senses."




I Pray in Poems


Book Description

I pray in poems explores the intersection of great works of poetry and Christian faith, offering meditations on what these works illustrate about Christian living. Readers will encounter authors as diverse as William Shakespeare, T.S. Eliot, Rumi, Mary Oliver, and Anna Kamienska. Each poem is followed by an analytical reflection that explores the work and places it within the context of one or more Biblical passages. These meditations will assist the reader in understanding and appreciating the poetry, and will also offer insightful, perhaps even inspiring, thoughts on what it means to live a life in faith.




Saved by a Poem


Book Description

Can someone really be saved by a poem? In Kim Rosen’s book, the answer is a re­sounding "Yes!" Poetry, the most ancient form of prayer, is a necessary medicine for our times: a companion through difficulty; a guide when we are lost; a salve when we are wounded; and a conduit to an inner source of joy, freedom, and insight. Whether you are a lover of poetry or have yet to discover its power, Rosen offers a new way to experience a poem. She encourages you to feel the poem as you might an affirmation or sacred text, which can align every level of your being. In an uncertain world, Saved by a Poem is an emphatic call to cultivate the ever-renewable resources of the heart. Through poetry, the unspeakable can be spoken, the unendurable endured, and the miraculous shared. Weaving teaching, story, verse, and memoir, Rosen guides you to find a poem that speaks to you so you can take it into your life and become a voice for its wisdom in the world. Inspirational audio download included! Featuring the voices of well-known authors reading a favorite poem and discussing its personal significance: Joan Borysenko, Andrew Harvey, Jane Hirshfield, Marie Howe, Grace Yi-Nan Howe, Robert Holden, Stanley Kunitz, Elizabeth Lesser, Thomas Moore, Christiane Northrup, Cheryl Richardson, Kim Rosen, and Geneen Roth.




Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings: Poems


Book Description

A musical, magical, resilient volume from the first Native American Poet Laureate of the United States. In these poems, the joys and struggles of the everyday are played against the grinding politics of being human. Beginning in a hotel room in the dark of a distant city, we travel through history and follow the memory of the Trail of Tears from the bend in the Tallapoosa River to a place near the Arkansas River. Stomp dance songs, blues, and jazz ballads echo throughout. Lost ancestors are recalled. Resilient songs are born, even as they grieve the loss of their country. Called a "magician and a master" (San Francisco Chronicle), Joy Harjo is at the top of her form in Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings. Finalist for the Griffin Poetry Prize




Oh Pray My Wings Are Gonna Fit Me Well


Book Description

This collection of thirty-six poems is, once again, eloquent evidence of Maya Angelou's continuing celebration of life: Here are poems of love and memory; poems of racial confrontation; songs of the street and songs from the heart.




A Thousand Mornings


Book Description

The New York Times-bestselling collection of poems from celebrated poet Mary Oliver In A Thousand Mornings, Mary Oliver returns to the imagery that has come to define her life’s work, transporting us to the marshland and coastline of her beloved home, Provincetown, Massachusetts. Whether studying the leaves of a tree or mourning her treasured dog Percy, Oliver is open to the teachings contained in the smallest of moments and explores with startling clarity, humor, and kindness the mysteries of our daily experience.




Amazing Graces


Book Description

A collection of prayers and poems for reading in the morning, at meals, at bedtime, or anytime.