‘Dr. C. F. W. Walther, a pastor who lived in the 1800’s, wrote: “Every Christian may apply to himself the declaration of God: ‘This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.’” As God’s children, not only do we have the privilege of participating in His mission to redeem and renew creation, we also do so in the strength and knowledge of our Father’s delight.’

— Dan Cruver (2009). “What Orphans Need: Christians Who Live in the Joy of Their Father’s Delight” (quoting C. F. W. Walther (1938). 25 Theses on Law & Gospel, “Thesis 18”).

Walther was the founding president of the Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod (LCMS). Note that I have not (as yet) read his work beyond the above quotation.

To change which newsletter sections you receive, click here.

By default, you will only ever receive my poems.

“I would say to anyone whose heart burned within him, write freely what you feel, and then correct rigorously. The truth must give you your material and utterance; and then you must get rid of the faults that would interfere with the entrance of your utterance into the minds of those who may read. The effort after style ought to be but a removing of faults. Say and then say right.”

— George MacDonald (1890), Letter to George Bainton, quoted in Bainton’s The art of authorship: Literary reminiscences, methods of work, and advice to young beginners, personally contributed by leading authors of the day, “Good Writing: A Gift or an Art?”

Does this quotation call to mind any other passages? Share them in the comments below.

(If you want to change which newsletter sections you receive, you can do that here. By default you will only ever receive my poems.)

‘The temporal setting for John’s vision is “on the Lord’s day,” which is the earliest occurrence of the “Lord’s day” is Christian literature (1:10). It may refer to Easter Sunday or the eschatological day of the Lord but, more likely, it refers to Resurrection Day or Sunday. Just as Paul’s designation of the “Lord’s Supper” in 1 Cor. 11:20 means the “supper that belongs to the Lord,” so also John’s designation the “Lord’s day” means “the day that belongs to the Lord.” The temporal setting is important, for not only does the revelation take place on the day of worship but it occurs on that significant day of the week, the eighth day. John’s revelation occurs on the day that marks new beginnings.’

— James L. Resseguie (2009), The Revelation of John: A Narrative Commentary, “Revelation 1:9–20”, (emphasis mine).

(If you want to change which newsletter sections you receive, you can do that here. By default you will only ever receive my poems.)

“[T]he difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter—’tis the difference between the lightning-bug and the lightning.”

— Mark Twain (1890), Letter to George Bainton (Quote Investigator), quoted in Bainton’s The art of authorship: Literary reminiscences, methods of work, and advice to young beginners, personally contributed by leading authors of the day, “Methods: Conscious and Unconscious”.

• This work includes contributions from, among many others, George MacDonald, Edwin Abbot Abbot (aka “A. Square”), Christina Rossetti, William Morris, Robert Browning, Benjamin Jowett, Charles Spurgeon, and Philip Schaff.

I note that the lightning is not always the better choice.

Does this passage remind you of another? Share it in the comments.

(If you want to change which newsletter sections you receive, you can do that here. By default you will only ever receive my poems.)

‘“But surely you would explain your idea to one who asked you?”

I say again, if I cannot draw a horse, I will not write THIS IS A HORSE under what I foolishly meant for one. Any key to a work of imagination would be nearly, if not quite, as absurd.’

— George MacDonald (1893), A Dish of Orts : Chiefly Papers on the Imagination, and on Shakespeare, “The Fantastic Imagination”.
(Quoted in Michael Ward’s Planet Narnia, Chap. 1: “Silence”.)

I could say more, but will instead confine myself here to the observation that the qualification “nearly” bears — or ought to bear — a great deal of weight.

Compare the dialogue between Sissy Jupe, Thomas Gradgrind, and Bitzer in “Murdering the Innocents”, the second chapter of Dickens’ Hard Times (which I haven’t yet read in full). I think I first encountered this latter passage in a 2007 essay by Martin Cothran in the Memoria Press catalog.

(If you want to change which newsletter sections you receive, you can do that here. By default you will only ever receive my poems.)

“If you become a writer, you’ll be trying to describe the thing all your life: and lucky if, out of dozens of books, one or two sentences, just for a moment, come near to getting it across.”

― C. S. Lewis, letter to young Joan Lancaster, June 26, 1956.

(Letters of C. S. Lewis; or Collected Letters, volume 3.)

(If you want to change which newsletter sections you receive, you can do that here. By default you will only ever receive my poems.)

“Even in literature and art, no man who bothers about originality will ever be original: whereas if you simply try to tell the truth (without caring twopence how often it has been told before) you will, nine times out of ten, become original without ever having noticed it. The principle runs through all life from top to bottom. Give up yourself, and you will find your real self. Lose your life and you will save it. Submit to death, death of your ambitions and favorite wishes every day and death of your own body in the end: submit with every fibre of your being, and you will find eternal life. Keep back nothing. Nothing that you have not given away will be really yours. Nothing that has not died will ever be raised from the dead. Look for yourself, and you will find in the long run only hatred, loneliness, despair, rage, ruin, and decay. But look for Christ and you will find Him, and with Him everything else thrown in.”

― C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity, “The New Men.” (Ending the chapter and book.)

(If you want to change which newsletter sections you receive, you can do that here. By default you will only ever receive my poems.)

“So here I am, in the middle way, having had twenty years —
Twenty years largely wasted, the years of l’entre deux guerres —
Trying to learn to use words, and every attempt
Is a wholly new start, and a different kind of failure
Because one has only learnt to get the better of words
For the thing one no longer has to say, or the way in which
One is no longer disposed to say it. And so each venture
Is a new beginning, a raid on the inarticulate
With shabby equipment always deteriorating
In the general mess of imprecision of feeling,
Undisciplined squads of emotion. And what there is to conquer
By strength and submission, has already been discovered
Once or twice, or several times, by men whom one cannot hope
To emulate — but there is no competition —
There is only the fight to recover what has been lost
And found and lost again and again: and now, under conditions
That unpropitious. But perhaps neither gain nor loss.
For us, there is only the trying. The rest is not our business.”

[….]

(If you want to change which newsletter sections you receive, you can do that here. By default you will only ever receive my poems.)

Song by The Oh Hellos

There will come a soldier
Who carries a mighty sword
He will tear your city down, o lei o lai o lord
O lei, o lai, o lei, o lord
He will tear your city down, o lei o lai o lord

There will come a poet
Whose weapon is his word
He will slay you with his tongue, o lei o lai o lord
O lei, o lai, o lei, o lord
He will slay you with his tongue, o lei o lai o lord

There will come a ruler
Whose brow is laid in thorn
Smeared with oil like David's boy, o lei o lai o lord
O lei, o lai, o lei, o lord
Smeared with oil like David's boy, o lei o lai o lord

O lei, o lai, o lei, o lord
He will tear your city down, o lei o lai

Animation of Jesus Christ by Revaniarte

I jest, but I’ve been there; and do I still think we ought to be very careful about how we visually depict the mind-bending and heart-rending reality of our Lord’s incarnation — as we ought to be similarly careful in how we imagine or paraphrase his words or in how we conduct our practice of his supper.

However, I believe this animation by the Indonesian artist Revaniarte1 to be reverently and tastefully done. The Word became flesh, and flesh can be seen.2

“… Do you mark all this well, King Caspian?”

“I do indeed, Sir,” said Caspian. “I was wishing that I came from a more honorable lineage.”

“You come of the Lord Adam and the Lady Eve,” said Aslan. “And that is both honor enough to erect the head of the poorest beggar, and shame enough to bow the shoulders of the greatest emperor on earth. Be content.”

— C. S. Lewis, Prince Caspian, Chap. 15: “Aslan Makes a Door in the Air”

(If you want to change which newsletter sections you receive, you can do that here.)

Her face had changed completely and her eyes shone.

— C. S. Lewis (of Lucy Pevensie), Prince Caspian, Chap. 9: “What Lucy Saw”

“Aslan, Aslan. Dear Aslan,” sobbed Lucy. “At last.”

The great beast rolled over on his side so that Lucy fell, half sitting and half lying between his front paws. He bent forward and just touched her nose with his tongue. His warm breath came all round her. She gazed up into the large wise face.

“Welcome, child,” he said.

“Aslan,” said Lucy, “you’re bigger.”

“That is because you are older, little one,” answered he.

“Not because you are?”

“I am not. But every year you grow, you will find me bigger.”

— C. S. Lewis, Prince Caspian, Chap. 10: “The Return of the Lion”

(If you want to change which newsletter sections you receive, you can do that here.)

“The help will come,” said Trufflehunter. “I stand by Aslan. Have patience, like us beasts. The help will come. It may be even now at the door.”

­— Trufflehunter the Badger, in C. S. Lewis, Prince Caspian, Chap. 12: “Sorcery and Sudden Vengeance”

Poems, hymns, and other songs I loved into memory, along with others I have only lately learned to love.

I know a handful or these by, or nearly by, heart (❤️/🩷).

Table of Contents

• Old Songs

• New Songs

Old Songs

William Shakespeare (1564—1616)

• “To be, or not to be, that is the question” 🩷

  • Poetry Foundation, Standard Ebooks

John Donne (1572–1631)

• Holy Sonnet 11: [“Spit in my face, you Jews”]

  • Ryken

George Herbert (1593–1633)

• “Redemption” ❤️

  • Poetry Foundation, CCEL, Ryken

• “The Agony” ❤️

  • Friends of St. Andrew’s, CCEL, Ryken

• “The Elixir” ❤️

  • Poetry Foundation, CCEL, Ryken

• “The Collar” ❤️

  • Poetry Foundation, CCEL (1633), Ryken, The Priory

• “The Pulley” ❤️

  • Ryken, The Priory

• “Jordan (I)” 🩷

  • Poetry Foundation

• “Love (III)” ❤️

  • CCEL, Poetry Foundation, Ryken

• “The Jews”

  • CCEL

• “The Temper (I)”

  • Poetry Foundation

John Milton (1608–1674)

• Sonnet 7: “How soon hath Time” ❤️

  • Ryken, Poetry Foundation

• Sonnet 19: “When I consider how my light is spent” ❤️

  • Ryken, Poetry Foundation

John Newton (1725–1807)

• “Prayer answered by crosses” (“I asked the Lord”) ❤️

  • CCEL

William Cowper (1731–1800)

• “Light shining out of darkness” (“God moves in mysterious ways”) 🩷

  • CCEL

William Blake (1757–1827)

• “The Lamb”

  • Poetry Foundation, Blake’s Painting

• “The Tyger”

  • Poetry Foundation, Blake’s Painting

John Keats (1795–1821)

• “Ode on a Grecian Urn”

  • Poetry Foundation

Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822)

• “Ozymandias”

  • Poetry Foundation

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–1882)

• “A Psalm of Life: What the Heart of the Young Man Said to the Psalmist” 🩷

  • Poetry Foundation, Poems Ancient and Modern

Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809–1892)

• “The Kraken” ❤️

  • Academy of American Poets

Christina Rossetti (1830–1894)

• “An emerald is as green as grass”

  • Project Gutenberg, Poems by Heart

• “Who Has Seen the Wind?” 🩷

  • Project Gutenberg, Poetry Foundation, A Poetic Home

• “Stroke a flint…” 🩷

  • Project Gutenberg

Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844–1889)

[First published in 1918.]

• “God’s Grandeur” ❤️

  • Poetry Foundation, Academy of American Poets

• [“As Kingfishers Catch Fire”] ❤️

  • Poetry Foundation

• “Pied Beauty” 🩷

  • Poetry Foundation

    • Poems Ancient and Modern

• [“Carrion Comfort”] ❤️

  • Poetry Foundation

• [“Thou Art Indeed Just, Lord”] 🩷

  • Poetry Foundation

• [“It was a hard thing to undo this knot”]

  • Academy of American Poets

Simmering

• “The Leaden Echo and the Golden Echo”

  • Wikisource

  • Recommended by Kilby Austin in her “The pursuit of beauty: an answer”.

  • Recorded readings:

    • Richard Burton (YouTube)

    • Alec Guinness (YouTube)

Robert Frost (1874–1963)

• “Nothing Gold Can Stay” ❤️

  • Poetry Foundation, Academy of American Poets, A Poetic Home

    • Read by Frost (YouTube), Close reading by Dana Gioia (YouTube)

• “Fire and Ice” ❤️

  • Poetry Foundation, Academy of American Poets

T. S. Eliot (1888–1965)

• Four Quartets

  • Excerpts from “Burnt Norton,” (I)

  • Excerpts from “East Coker,” (V) 🩷

John Updike (1932–2009)

• “Seven Stanzas at Easter”

  • Modern Reformation

Seamus Heaney (1939–2013)

• “Digging”

  • Poetry Foundation

New Songs

Rhina Espaillat

• “Here” 🩷

  • Poems Ancient and Modern, Rattle

    Poems Ancient and Modern

    Today’s Poem: Here

    Read more

    2 months ago · 62 likes · 4 comments · Joseph Bottum

Luke Miller

• “A Blessing” 🩷

Coldplay

• “Viva La Vida”

  • YouTube (Official)

The Oh Hellos

• “Soldier, Poet, King” 🩷

• “Pray for Poets” ❤️

• “Good Friday Triptych”

• “Signposts”

• “For my son, upon glancing in a mirror”

Recommendations by readers

Rabbit Room roundup of Substack poets

I have yet to read something from each and every one of these poets, but I’m looking forward to working through the lists in coming days and weeks and years.

Do you also love any of these poems, hymns, or songs? If you do, let me know in the comments, and please do suggest others you think I might also appreciate.

(If you want to change which newsletter sections you receive, you can do that here.)