William Jolliff

William Jolliff is a poet, English Professor at George Fox University in Oregon, and a bluegrass banjo player. His chapbook Whatever Was Ripe won the 1998 Bright Hill Press poetry chapbook competition. His new full-length collection Twisted Shapes of Light has just appeared as part of the Poiema Poetry Series from Cascade Books. I am delighted to have been able to assist the poet as the editor of this book.

Jolliff is the editor of The Poetry of John Greenleaf Whittier (2000). He seems to have been particularly drawn to Whittier's verse because of their common Quaker heritage, and because 19th century American literature is a chosen field of study. Jolliff also edited the journal The Rolling Coulter which was published by Missouri Western State College. He has been playing five-string banjo and a variety of Appalachian folk instruments on stages around the US northwest for many years. (A Bill Jolliff You Tube search will prove rewarding.)

The following poem is from Twisted Shapes of Light and first appeared in Friends Journal.

The Hardness of the Pews

I didn’t mind the hardness of the pews then
and wouldn’t now. If you’ve been perched
on a tractor seat since dawn—or, worse yet,
if you’ve hopped off it half a hundred times
to change a shear bolt or clear a jam of stalks,
Good Lord, a walnut board with some curve
that’s shaped a little like a back is hardly short
of heaven. Or if you’ve been stacking hay,
packing back bales, the hottest, windless hours
of the afternoon, well, a seat in a church house
with a high ceiling and a window to the creek—
that’s likely the best rest you’ve found since dawn.

Especially Wednesday nights, pews didn’t matter.
You were shoulder-to-shoulder, hip-to-hip,
knees-to-linoleum beside those faithful few
who came to pray, to summon a God they not
only believed in, but who, you believed, cared;
to court the Divine with old familiar words of love.
Our thees and thous resounded off the walls.
Now I’m no longer quite that kind of faithful.
My theology? I suspect they’d hardly call me
in the fold. But I can think of far worse ways
to spend a summer evening, than kneeling
in the company of thirsty souls who want this:

to press their lips against the fleshy ear of God.

Posted with permission of the poet.

Entry written by D.S. Martin. His latest poetry collection, Conspiracy of Light: Poems Inspired by the Legacy of C.S. Lewis, is available from Wipf & Stock as is his earlier award-winning collection, Poiema.

Ed Zahniser

Ed Zahniser is a West Virginia poet whose work has appeared in over 100 magazines. He has published three chapbooks, and three full-length collections, the most recent of which is Mall-hopping with the Great I AM (2006).

He is also intricately tied to the wilderness preservation movement as the son of Howard Zahniser, who was a founding member of the Wilderness Society and contributing writer for The Wilderness Act in the U.S. His father, according to Ed Zahniser, “was very much driven by a religious sense of life. He had inherited from his parents the feeling that we should leave the world a better place than we found it and that this is not merely a noble sentiment but a moral obligation.”

As part of this legacy, Zahniser’s poetry is frequently focused on nature and the natural world. He lives in Shepherdstown, West Virginia, where he is the editor of Good News Paper, which he co-founded in 1979.

Cormorants

Each year they show up in the bare tree by the river
---bridge
like dutiful grandparents making yearly pilgrimage
upstream. We never witness their return
that may well take an alternate route

noted elsewhere by others likewise amazed
at these dark birds’ faithfulness with keeping
their singular splice in the way things are
—dotting their bare tree like musical notation

side-turned heads flagged whole notes
in early summer’s long-awaited hymn of praise

Prayer for a Hope to Share

Forced so long to hope alone
can we find a hope to share
and unreservedly?
We’re out of time for throwing half a bone
each to each. Half to care is not to care
at all. The path ahead looms swervingly

what with the cross at our backs.
How odd to hope on a death
with a long, still longed-for promise of return.
Two thousand years following in tracks
as gossamer as, however holy, spirit breath.
All is vapor. Yet I cannot help but yearn

to turn and turn again; to put my face
to that persistent promise.
What fabric lasts without its knowing weaver
To restore these tatters to a former grace
however flawed? Yes, I would miss
the curious comforts of the true believer.

"Cormorants" first appeared at Terrain.org and "Prayer for a Hope to Share" first appeared in William Jolliff's The Rolling Coulter. These poems were posted with the poet’s permission.

Entry written by D.S. Martin. He is the award-winning author of the poetry collections Poiema (Wipf & Stock) and So The Moon Would Not Be Swallowed (Rubicon Press). They are both available at: www.dsmartin.ca