Has it really been seven years since you first pulled me from those fields, away from all I knew, away from sweet simplicity, the simplicity I can’t reclaim? Is it simplicity I seek, that small-town life: prosperity? Tough to do with a dangling dream that taunts and haunts and teases yet frees. If simplicity means liberation then maybe it’s simplicity I seek. Or is it complexity that frees, this bursting dream: the key? Yes, I think it’s freedom that compels me

Have you ever stopped and listened? To the clanking silverware, to the cicada choir, to the hum of a dozen engines at an intersection, to the rumble of tires on the pavement, to the buzz of a dying street light, to the nibbling squirrel, to the panting dog, to the kettle’s cry, to the gurgling drain? Have you ever walked slowly like you have nowhere to go, like your meeting can wait, like your to-do list is not holding you captive, like the world is your heaven and all is to

Here, in this hermitage in the woods, sat a man with his typewriter a half-century before. Thousands of words, from his spirit, through his gloves, touching millions of souls, and moving my own. An aching heart, a furious mind, his only antidote: to write. A complex man, a simple life, his truest reality: Christ inside. I told Brother Paul I'd like to walk where Merton walked. We hugged on the porch where his soul had danced. By Stephen Copeland This poem was firs

"Embers" is the third and final poem in a series of three poems about winter. The first two are "Osiris" and "Teresa." Body, where did you go? You fall when you run because your feet are numb. Your hand cannot write when its fingers are locked, frozen like white forests, the silent stillness of the fields blanketed with grace though death is underneath. No branch, no root, no man is free from this strange Paschal mystery. Soul, where did you go? Your mind cannot th

To give all I can is all I know. To pour out all I am, my devotion. The mule with its will and its hope to attain the prize that is tied to its head in the end only looks like a fool. But I won't stop running for You. Even if You laugh at me, too. The man with his heart and his hope to grab hold of she who fled to the woods in the end only falls from the sky. But I'll bleed until the day I die. Even if love is a lie. He held me, he held me, he held me when I t

It's okay that you move slow. That makes you different and precious. It's okay that you're inexperienced. Your innocence is beautiful and a gift. It's okay that you feel betrayed. Your wound helps you to create. It's okay that you are broken. Your brokenness helps your heart break for others. It's okay that you feel lost. You must first be lost to experience the hope and thrill of being found. It's okay that no one understands. Your complexities help you to listen a

One thing that I love about the Psalms is that they are emotionally raw—an unedited account of the human experience. At times, David eloquently praises God, overcome with gratitude and joy. Other times, he is full of doubt and frustration. And then there are times when he asks God to kill his enemies and bash his enemies' children's heads against rocks. The Psalms challenge me to experience the depth and range of my emotions and to then move through those emotions so that I c