The Poetry of R.E. Slater

"Autobiographies of great nations are written in three manuscripts – a book of deeds, a book of words, and a book of art. Of the three, I would choose the latter as truest testimony." - Sir Kenneth Smith, Great Civilisations

"I must write each day without fail, not so much for the success of the work, as in order not to get out of my routine." - Leo Tolstoy

I have never believed that one should wait until one is inspired because I think the pleasures of not writing are so great that if you ever start indulging them you will never write again. - John Updike

"The life of every man is a diary in which he means to write one story, and writes another; and his humblest hour is when he compares the volume as it is with what he vowed to make it." - J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan

Poetry is the shadow cast by our streetlight imaginations." - Lawrence Ferlinghetti

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Monday, February 27, 2017

R.E. Slater - A Faith For All Seasons

A Faith For All Seasons

by R.E. Slater

In a distant time there lived a grizzled carpenter
known for his wisdom, love, and generosity,

where trade was plied in earnest craft

and living homilies bespoke the lives of men,

always in need their times and rhythms

though years sped by in their seasons,

where a humble workshop gripped its work

forging fire to iron for courage needed.

At the start this child-like craftsman
learned the cruelty of life’s wandering ways,
growing by trial and character in wisdom learned
offering love’s soft glows that glimmering shone,
lighting lean days ahead against hard times without
warming memories that melded faith to hope,
necessary for the steadiness needed to the
hard forges pressing down on flesh and blood.

As winters gave way to muddy springs, sowing to harvest,

rests to toils, laughter to tears, fasts to feasts,

so the rhythms of life were met in steady homage

by faith’s many colors a’washed a rare vibrancy,

sharing a Savior’s faithful presence in generous hand

able to turn a timbreled piece to glowing moonshine,

harden a pliant willow to withstand long winters

or carve a plain stick released its glowing artistry.

Hardy cradles were made for newborn life,

boughs were bent and woven for cushioned rest,

tables for service, shelves for care, doors for entry,

or fences to protect, stables for safety, troughs for feed,

a cane to walk, a roof staying rains fair and hard,

cupboards to bear life’s fraught necessaries,

all imagined, needed, or wanted were given in their time,

completing men’s journeys from dawn to eveningtide.

Even so, the seasons of faith, its greens and golds, reds or

blacks, purples or rose, shading color to calendar,

to the wheels of labor or laughter, rest or harrow,

grinding steadily away against human frailty,

reminding nothing is lost when done in love

for love is the forge where all lives dance,

built of song or mirth rising to the altars of life

unlocking a soul’s faith weaving its cradles and turns.

R.E. Slater

February 27, 2017

*Based on the Liturgical Church Calendar

"Using the structure of the liturgical calendar and the life of Jesus as inspiration I wished to explore faith as a work and a practice in our lives as we struggle with morality and mortality. In our feeble faith we will struggle, yeah, too oftentimes fail, and yet must learn humility. To laugh with God over our vulnerabilities while striving to honor Him in all that we say or do when seeking to live for our Lord and Savior even as He lived for us during His earthly life and for His heavenly Father. We do this by living out a divine life of faith where the miraculous becomes ordinary even as the ordinary becomes sacred when imbued with the life of God who is faithful and our very hope for all our ‘morrows and for the world that lies ahead."

@copyright R.E. Slater Publications

References

Sounding the Seasons: Seventy sonnets for the Christian year,

by Malcolm Guite

Illustrations