What Carries Us
poetry as spiritual practice
I peddle my bike to the neighborhood across the cornfield, jean purse slung over my body, Peter Cetera’s “Glory of Love” playing in my mind like my own personal soundtrack. It’s summer 1986. On the way home from running errands with my mom, I saw a yard sale sign stuck in the ground. That’s where I’m headed.
I buy two things: a bracelet and a book. That silver bracelet is still in my jewelry box today. It’s silver, stamped “Mexico”, and inlaid with abalone. I wore that bracelet until one of the abalone panels popped off. I couldn’t bear to get rid of it. I’ll fix it one day. The book was a dogeared copy of S.E. Hinton’s The Outsiders which I’ll carry in my jean purse for the next four years.
I’ll carry what I learned from that book for the rest of my life.
What captivated me then, and continues to carry me now, is how poetry functions in the lives of Hinton’s characters. The title characters are exactly that: outsiders – vulnerable kids pushed to the edge of society.
They are poor, thought of as ‘white trash’ by the wealthy teens who live on the other side of town.
Some of them are orphans. A tragic accident leaves the eldest brother, barely an adult himself, to care for his younger brothers.
Some of them are victims of abuse. Johnny’s parents constantly fight. One night, he decides to sleep in the park, instead of going home, and convinces his friend Ponyboy, the youngest of the orphans, to come with him, a decision that will change both of their lives forever.
After a tragic and harrowing series of events, these two, for fear of what is to come, go on the run and hold up in an abandoned church out in the country. There, they subsist on bologna sandwiches and sunrises, but they’re sustained by poetry. Ponyboy recites Robert Frost’s “Nothing Gold Can Stay” to Johnny. Words from that poem, and its allegory of innocence, become Johnny’s last words to Ponyboy.
The poem provides purpose in senselessness, meaning amid calamity, and light in shadow times.
That grabbed me.
I started reading poems on the regular, asking for volumes for Christmas, and picking up poetry books at thrift stores.
Lines of verse lingered in my mind.
Poems imprinted themselves on my life — I could see them in my mind.
Given my interest in poetry, early in my ministry career, I saw a retreat about poetry and its power advertised at a local retreat center. The program was based on the Sam M. Intrator and Megan Scribner book Teaching with Fire: Poetry that Sustains the Courage to Teach, a collection of 88 poems chosen by teachers, including – no surprise – Roberts Frost’s “Nothing Gold Can Stay”. The retreat opened the book’s originally intended audience to anyone doing hard work in the world, work that needs inspiration against all odds.
I needed that kind of fuel. Work was hard and I was starting to forget who I was.
“Poetry has forever helped us remember what it means to be human,” remind Tom Vander Ark and Parker J. Palmer in the Teaching with Fire introduction. “(P)oetry has a way of slipping past the ego and intellect to speak directly to the heart about matters of great moment. And when the heart has received a message, we find it hard to turn away, even if the message engages us with issues that yield to no easy fix; if that were not the case, why would so many people be working toward a world of truth, justice, and mercy?” As a pastor, I face plenty of moments from which I want to turn away, and even more with no easy fix – families struggling with generations of addiction, young people who push and push when all they really want is to be drawn in, folks facing incurable disease, intense conflict, funerals for people who should have his whole life ahead of them, systems that exploit, supports that break down, evil masquerading as its opposite. Amid the heart-breaking challenge of tending to the worst of the worst moments in life, the daily reading of poetry became my balm. I started and never stopped.
And for that I am so glad, especially given everything we face in 2025 America.
Reading poetry every day is my most sustaining spiritual practice.
It carries me.
It’s what grounds me, gives me a different perspective, and gives me hope.
And you know how I feel about hope.
For years, I’ve posted a daily poem on social media. Some days, I wake up with a poem running through my head. Other days, I go search for the poem that fits the morning’s mood, or the one that speaks to what we are facing as a community, nation, or world. I read poems at the funerals over which I preside and retreats I lead. I read a poem nearly every time I preach. Poetry itself preaches: it roots us in reality while inviting us to transcend it.
We need more rooting while transcending right now.
After the election, I told you that I need a punching bag and a playlist to get through this. I also told you I needed more than that – I need joy and community too. Turns out, I also need poetry. It helps me recalibrate hope on the regular. That’s why I’d like to offer you another playlist of sorts, not of songs, but of poems. These are the words that provide purpose in senselessness, meaning amid calamity, and light in shadow times, the ones I keep like that treasured old bracelet in a drawer.
Here’s a list in no particular order, 31 poems in all, one for each day of the longest months. You’ll notice I have favorites, poets like Naomi Shihab Nye, Andrea Gibson, and Jan L. Richardson, all people whom I’ve had the honor to meet. Some of these, like #1, I’ve carried a long time. Some are new to me. They may hit you right in the place where your soft vulnerability meets your strongest, bravest heart, or not. I don’t know. I do know that you probably have poems to share and I’d love to read those, so share them in the comments.
Leah’s List of Poetry
1. “Nothing Gold Can Stay” by Robert Frost is a forever favorite about innocence. As Johnny says, “Stay Gold, Ponyboy. Stay Gold.” Read it or listen to it performed in the movie.
2. “Shoulders” by Naomi Shihab Nye always feels like the reminder we need, no matter the day, of what is necessary in this life. Read “Shoulders”, or listen to the poet recite it.
3. “Angels of the Get Through” by Andrea Gibson is the poem that comes to mind every time I think of my dearest friends, the ones I cannot do this life without. Watch the official video.
4. “In Blackwater Woods” by Mary Oliver is what I read anytime I experience a loss — someone dies, moves, or moves on. Read the poem AND what Park Palmer wrote about it, and Mary Oliver, following her death in 2019.
5. “Dreams Before Waking” by Adrienne Rich poses a most necessary question. “What would it mean to live in a city whose people were changing each other's despair into hope?” Look on page 7 of this pdf to read.
6. “A Small Needful Fact” by Ross Gay is a poem with the most delicate balance of tragic and tender. You can read the poem and click on the link at the bottom of the page to listen to an interview with him.
7. “Passover Remembered” by Alla Bozarth came as an ordination gift from my sister-friend Rev. Angela Menke Ballou. There is an urgency in it that I feel in my bones. You can read it on the author’s own facebook page.
8. “Grief Astronomer” by Andrea Gibson is the poem about people who have broken lives, but are not broken down by life….or at least, the encouragement comes in the poem to be one of those people. Watch Andrea Gibson perform “Grief Astronomer”.
9. “The Peace of the Wild Things” by Wendell Berry is something I read often. I am fearful often these days but, here, the “day blind stars” remind me “to rest in the grace of the world”. And peace comes. Read and listen to the poet himself read this poem.
10. “Time Capsule” by Manon Voice is an epic force of a poem as is Manon herself, who I am honored to call a friend. You can read “Time Capsule” here and listen to Manon Voice read it on Soundcloud.
11. “Years From Now When You Are Weary” by Julia Kasdorf is the poem I read when i am missing my mom and utterly exhausted. Those two things almost always coincide. It’s a deeply personal poem for me — I ended up on the wrong bus after my first day of Kindergarten. That’s a different story for a different time.
12. “Gone From My Sight” by Luther F. Beecher is recited at nearly every funeral at which I preside. The imagery helps us frame the mysterious and painful thing that is death. It is, by the way, often wrongly attributed to Henry Van Dyck.
13. “Good Bones” by Maggie Smith is just so real — it is clever and yet cuts right to the quick.
14. “Passover Pilgrim” by Maren Tirabassi has a twist that takes my breath away every time I read it, although for people not familiar with Christian scripture, the twist will be missed. If that happens for you, comment and I’m happy to unpack it for you. Rev. Tirabassi is an incredibly prolific poet, insightful and brilliant, truly.
15. “Blessing the Dust” by Jan L Richardson comes as such a relief for anyone feeling useless, hopeless, or meaningless.
16. “Kindness” by Naomi Shihab Nye is an invitation. It comes as a reminder than gentleness can be born from tragedy, rather than bitterness.
17. “Dissolver of Sugar” By Rumi is the poem I read any time I feel completely undone by life. May what comes as my undoing dissolve me like sugar in tea rather than destroy me. You can read it here.
18. “Please” by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer is a new poem to me, as is the poet. A friend texted it to me just the other week. But its been on repeat in my head ever since.
19. “Calling All Grand Mothers” by Alice Walker is that reminder to “rise and take your place in the leadership of the world”. And you have to listen to Alice Walker read it. The pause between Grand and Mothers matters.
20. “Prayer for the Morning” by Audette Fulbright Fulson calls us to action, even when we are weary. Read it here.
21. “Perhaps the World Ends Here” by Joy Harjo speaks to the power of what happens at the kitchen table. Read the poem here or listen to Joy Harjo read it.
22. “Present Light” by Charles Ghinga is only 20 words, but those words are some of the most affirming I’ve ever read.
23. “Blessing When the World is Ending” by Jan L. Richardson is the one I pull out every time we live through another unprecedented event.
24. “Jesus at the Gay Bar” by Jay Hulme is the one I read to every queer college kid who wanders into my office in the little church with the rainbow flags on it. And you can see their faces change — this poem is life giving.
25. “Picking Clean the Bones” by Sally Atkins is another new to me poem. The line “We are listening each other into being” got me.
26. “Red Brocade” by Naomi Shihab Nye is what I think of each Monday night while serving guests at Jubilee cafe. When you click on the link to read it, there is an audio file there also.
27. “Prayer for Werewolves” by Stephanie Burt is a heartbreaker for hard people, and we’re all hard people. You can read it here and listen to Pádraig Ó Tuama read it too.
28. “A Reminder for Smaller Beings” by Nikita Gill, who is such a bright light among today’s poets, gifts us with this poem about endurance and trying again.
29. “Yes” by William Stafford reminds us that nothing is guaranteed and calls us to each moment’s magic.
30. “Good Grief” by Andrea Gibson is, again, such a short poem. Just 8 words. EIGHT! But they speak volumes. This wordy preacher lady is grateful for people who know what to do with an economy of words.
31. “What I Learned From My Mother” by Julia Kasdorf calls me to the ordinary graces in life and their importance.
This is a treasure trove! Thank you.