Poets’ Corner
Alfred Hope Patten
1885-1958, Anglo-Catholic priest and restorer of the Shrine in 1922 Your name has a certain gleam to it – eccentric sounding, as you were yourself, misfit farmer’s boy, dodger of tests, perhaps the printed word oppressed you unlike the sensory glory of High Church. You loved the drench of incense, the cleansing douse of holy…
Excommunication
“IT IS ORDERED that the defendant be placed on probation, and the defendant shall … not consume intoxicants at any time or any place, and not be present in a place where the sale of alcohol is the major business.” I was most sad when they said unto me, Let’s go into the house where…
The Dream of Descartes
I A dry heat glowing in his shins and brain afire, The night sky gray behind the distant münster’s spire, He found himself awake upon a rain-slicked street, His boot heels slipping on the stones; the wind searched every pleat Of his brown cloak and struck his body till it spun Him back and all…
Spiegel im Spiegel
A child dancing in rain, Glimpsed somewhere in Nigeria… And all the drops contain The modest area And quick and lithe Of limb, this boy, Emblem of joy, Graceful and blithe As if each precious drop Could be a tiny, godly glass Repeating without stop The shapes that whirl and pass: In lieu of…
Thirty Years’ Creeper War
Into its roots I thrust my spade, each spring, to kill it where it cloaks and climbs my lovely house, and chokes all other green things there arrayed. With my bare hands I pull new shoots before they batten and start to braid themselves into a wild cascade. I never manage to kill the roots….
Book Release: The Commonwealth by Dan Rattelle
We are excited to announce the release of Dan Rattelle’s new chapbook, The Commonwealth. Written, in large part, during his time studying in St Andrews, Scotland with the poet Don Patterson, The Commonwealth looks across the sea toward Rattelle’s home of Massachusetts for inspiration. The craftsman and craftsmanship that remains in our technological age provides…
Upon These Boughs Which Shake Against the Cold
Her script was always lovely and unique, And still unique when it began to wobble, Along with spoken words. Increasing trouble With memory made her less inclined to speak. But still, she wrote her letters. Before we’d started school, she’d made us readers: Books were our favorite toys; once every week We’d take some back…
THE HERMIT HEARS OWLS
Two of them are talking in the woods. The night’s so still and bright with moon that he Lies staring on his pillow. Almost, it’s words He hears tossed back and forth from tree to tree. Almost, it’s wind whose wings slip past the window, Wavering the light. Almost, it’s silence, Almost ghost. From bed…
Basilique du Sacre-Coeur
The steps of the Sacre-Coeur billow down the hill like a robe, and hundreds loiter on the hem, maybe hoping to be healed. Church steps have cradled them for centuries—the crippled, the homeless, the lost tourists, the tired pedestrians—but here at this place are three hundred steps instead of five or ten. The loiterers…
A Prayer for Split Men
Almighty God, To whom all restless hearts are open All old desires known And from whom no guilty secrets are hid Of thy great mercy, Regard the split men. Regard the man Who still dreams Christian dreams, Who cannot pass a chapel Except he enters in, Who cannot hear a carol Except he joins the…