Poetry & Pushpins

~ The Writings of S.L. Woodford

Poetry & Pushpins

Tag Archives: Christian community

Lenten Openings

21 Friday Mar 2014

Posted by poetryandpushpins in Pushpins (Daily Life), Religious Exploration

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Christian community, Lent

Ugh. Lent.

For me, this Christian season is one of the most uncomfortable. Not because I have to give something up, not because it reminds me of my mortality, but because it is a season where I must wait for God’s transformation. Not on my terms. But on the whims of the Divine.

I explore the beauty and discomfort of this sort of waiting in my latest piece for HartfordFAVS. Below is the link, if you’re curious:

http://hartfordfavs.com/2014/03/20/lenten-mornings/

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Train Windows

27 Monday Jan 2014

Posted by poetryandpushpins in Pushpins (Daily Life), Religious Exploration

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Christian community, countryside

A backyard full of large rounds of wood, deer grazing on clover beside a graffitied wall, a blue tent sitting among the not yet decomposed autumn leaves: I see the strangest things from the windows of trains. Perhaps I get to see these intimate and odd images because the people, the landscapes, the animals, right outside my window forget that I’m looking. Trains move fast. Plus, it’s easy to miss things when books and electronics and conversations distract you.

This month for HartfordFAVS, I get to write about one of these strange window encounters. Who would have thought that a blue tent, sitting in the quiet of deep winter, still among autumn’s leaves, would make me think of how God chooses to show us presence in our daily lives.

You can read the piece here:
http://hartfordfavs.com/2014/01/26/blue-tent/

Something out of Nothing: Writing and Advent

13 Friday Dec 2013

Posted by poetryandpushpins in Religious Exploration, The Creative Life

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Advent, Christian community, New Haven, the creative process, writing

Writing can be tough; especially, when I’ve been looking at a white, blank screen for hours. But, there is also a joy and an anticipation in those silent moments. I always hope that something wonderful will soon appear on that empty screen, making the wait worth it.

In my latest piece for HartfordFAVS, I explore the ways that writing, my city, and the Advent season all wait for something to be created out of nothing.

You can read it at the FAVS website here

Sublime Fluff or, How the English Countryside Failed Paula

19 Tuesday Nov 2013

Posted by poetryandpushpins in Pushpins (Daily Life), Religious Exploration

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Christian community, countryside, England

It was all going to be so Spiritually Moving. That was before a damp, five hour walk through the English countryside. Instead of arriving at her destination, an abandoned Victorian church, full of poetry and prayers, Paula arrived moist and cursing. The church was not the majestic Gothic ruin the travel section of the New York Times reported it to be. Barely a tracing of walls and roof, it was a sublime disappointment. Clover covered the ground where pews and floors used to be and thickets of blackberries tumbled over a cracked, multi-angled display of rock and rubble, all that remained of the altar.

And there, waddling through the jagged stones was a rabbit. Lop-eared, furry, and brown, it reached out its silky neck to bite off one the berries, voluptuously swollen by many days of rain.

Paula saw it and snorted. A rabbit grazing in the foundations of a church seemed to be further proof of the Englishman’s godlessness. Like this pathetic non-structure, the church she attended in London was void of life, including peckish rabbits. When she showed up for Mass on Sundays, the rector, abandoning his stereotypical English reserve, would sprint down the main aisle to meet her: He is starting a young person’s reading group. Would she be interested? Would she be willing to bring some of her American university mates?

A rabbit grazing in the foundations of a church seemed to be further proof of the Englishman’s godlessness.

If Paula wanted to see the hearts of the English moved by something greater than themselves, she nipped down to her neighborhood’s pub after Sunday service. There, she found men and women clustered around flat-screen tellies, watching the local football match. She often heard the tune “A Mighty Fortress is Our God,” robustly accompanying a good-natured exploration of Player A’s sexual prowess or Team X’s lack thereof.

Paula sighed. She missed being in a crowded church where people sang hymns instead of football songs. She missed a God that she could recognize.

Thunder rumbled. Exasperated, she looked up into the graying sky. If she tarried much longer, the five-hour walk back to her Bed & Breakfast would be in a downpour. She departed, her heavy steps carelessly treading on twigs and sod. There were no churches here.

The rabbit, usually frightened by loud noises, did not notice Paula’s departure. Back tensed and rigidly arched, it crouched on the altar’s remains, laboriously expelling tiny droplets of excrement.

In one of those droplets was a cluster of blackberry seeds.

As the rain began to fall, the seeds sunk deep into the soil, blessing the loam with the promise of new life.

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Icons at 3:19 A.M.

13 Wednesday Nov 2013

Posted by poetryandpushpins in Pushpins (Daily Life), Religious Exploration, The Creative Life

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Christian community, grief, technology, the creative process, writing

“Icons” is my newest non-fiction. Published in the The Living Church, this little piece is getting a lot of attention. It was even mentioned as a story “worth noting” by AnglicansOnline. The editor writes that:

S.L. Woodford writes in The Living Church (Milwaukee) on death, grief, and text-messages.

And, I do just that. Yet, I cannot think of it as a stand alone piece. In my mind, it will always be linked to something I wrote for Hartford Faith & Values entitled “3:19 A.M.” Both deal with my shock, grief, and yearning for beauty after the unexpected death of my mother. “3:19 A.M.” explores the morning I received the news and “Icons” tells the story of the day after.

Mom’s been dead for five months and I’m deeply glad that I wrote both pieces so soon after her death—each one preserves the hardest, but richest, moments of my life, while setting my love for her as a permanent reality, like a leaf within amber.

Read “Icons” here.

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