Contemplative poetry: is it something to define, or something to enter? Is it something one knows when one feels it, or when one is told about it? Is a contemplative poet known by reputation, or discovered by surprise? The contemplative poet might be the one knocked silly by the discovery of having written such a surprising poem. The soul is called into a contemplative quiet. The inward aching yearns for words to convey what cannot be said. Only prayer would do, no other

Our whole lives have been spent in time, and are measured by time. We mark the day of each birth, and celebrate it annually. We engrave the dates of birth and death on grave stones. We organize each day and week for the proper use of our time. We read the daily news, and study the history of events through time. We might be bored by the slowness of time at one moment, and dismayed by the swiftness of its passing in the next. We ought to be fully familiar with and understandi

We encounter many kinds of storms as we journey through this world, for some, they are more destructive than for others. We naturally react with fear, and worry, and anger over why it must be this way. God knows we are passing through a fallen world, and He asks us to try and see things as He does, or to trust that He is in control, and will guide us all the way. As a psychotherapist, I work with clients who live in nursing homes. An elderly man who I will call Alex, recently