New book probes poetry’s power to stir the soul

Posted: 11/16/07

New book probes poetry’s power to stir the soul

By Cecile S. Holmes

Religion News Service

CHICAGO (RNS)—Poetry is that unusual combination of words with the power to move, delight, nurture and transport readers beyond the here-and-now. It also can nourish our souls, according to the authors of a new book celebrating how poetry can kindle the spiritual in attentive readers.

“Poetry slows us down. It asks us to look—and look again. Poems have a way of reminding us we are part of something larger than ourselves,” said Judith Valente, co-author/editor of the new volume, Twenty Poems to Nourish Your Soul.

Valente, a Chicago-based on-air correspondent for the PBS show Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly and Chicago Public Radio, wrote the book with her husband, Charles Reynard, a judge of the 11th Judicial Circuit in central Illinois.

Their book represents both the chronicle of a deeply personal journey and an opening for others seeking a deeper connection to the divine. The 20 poems included are drawn mainly from modern American poets. Most are not overtly religious, nor are they the sort of poems usually found in anthologies of religious or spiritual poets.

Instead, the poems collected by Valente and Reynard lure readers into slow recognition of the divine presence, steeping them in identifying how mystery moves into life through poetry.

“Finding God by paying attention is the theme of this collection,” Valente writes in her introduction. “God isn’t mentioned by name very often in these poems, but God’s presence suffuses them.”

The poems are organized around 10 themes—attentiveness, gratitude, acceptance, simplicity, praise, work, loss, body and soul, mystery and prayer. To Valente and Reynard, each is a foundation stone for building a rich inner spiritual life.

Two poems are offered with each theme, along with a short commentary that is more invitation than exposition. Each explores why the poem is meaningful to Valente or to Reynard, and then suggests readers reflect on its meaning in their own lives.

In recent months, Reynard and Valente have been conducting workshops to help busy professionals learn how poems can become “soul friends” and pathways to solitude and deeper spirituality.

Poetry, Reynard says, is a “centering influence” in his life, a prayer from which he gains strength and balance.

“This work seems less and less different than my past and professional work,” he said. “Paying attention is important for me as a judge. Poetry is helping me to become a better judge because I am to recognize people by listening and watching more acutely.”