So I was listening to a back-episode of the Poetry Magazine podcast. The issue they were featuring was on religious poetry and though I've harbored resentful/ambivalent/uncharitable feelings for Poetry and poetry for going on years now, something about this episode struck me. More precisely, something about the poetry they were featuring struck me--in the epiphanaic way that falls teenagers in love with poetry in the first place.
There is something magical about religious poetry. Let me broaden: the thing that can be most magical about poetry seems almost inherent in religious poetry. Because, I think, poetry is most powerful when it's trying to put into words something ineffable--to tap into experience you hardly knew you had because you didn't have words for it. And this, of course, is also when religion is most powerful--when it gives a physical (verbal, shareable) manifestation to something inexplicable. Religious poetry can speak so deeply to us because religion, in many real ways, is poetry. When high school students wonder why poetry just can't come out and *say* something, I think a legitimate answer could be (if you weren't teaching in a public school) a reference to the parables: Jesus didn't come out and say the messages he was trying to teach because parables leave space for the hearer to learn the lesson they need to learn, to fill in the gaps with their own experience and with new insights. A deeper example of this, even, is mortality: we could've read a list of lessons we were to learn, had to learn, before we got here, but we can't learn them without the hard work of living. Poetry, in a small way--I don't want to get ahead of myself here--functions on the same mechanism. It doesn't tell, it shows, it guides you down a foggy path and asks that you fill in gaps; and, as you fill them in, you are changed, your ideas are added to. When it's done right.
And so, to celebrate Easter and National Poetry Month (I'd never thought how serendipitous the overlap is/can be) a couple of favorite religious poems (some more secular, some less, some I've posted, some I haven't. I think.)

God's Grandeur
Gerard Manley Hopkins

THE WORLD is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;
And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;
And wears man’s smudge and shares man’s smell: the soil
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.
And for all this, nature is never spent;
There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
And though the last lights off the black West went
Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs—
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

John 15

 I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman.
 Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit.
 Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.
 Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me.
 I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.
 If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.
 If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.
 Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples.
 As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you: continue ye in my love.
 If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father's commandments, and abide in his love.
 These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full.




Sunset
Louise Gluck

Listen
My great happiness
is the sound your voice makes
calling to me even in despair; my sorrow
that I cannot answer you
in speech you accept as mine.
You have no faith in your own language.
So you invest
authority in signs
you cannot read with any accuracy.
And yet your voice reaches me always.
And I answer constantly,
my anger passing
as winter passes. My tenderness
should be apparent to you
in the breeze of summer evening
and in the words that become
your own response.



Amen.

Easter Feeling

A couple of years ago (spurred by a friends' delicious recipe and a fondness of cardamom) I started making pulla (braided Finnish cardamom bread) for friends for Christmas. It's fancy and delicious and not too sweet. And if Santa Claus lives anywhere I'm pretty sure it's in Finland (not to disregard my mom's insistence that Santa is German--doesn't Finland seem both colder and also a little more magical?). The practice-verging-on-tradition is comforting and it smells nice and is impressive.

This year, I'm adding to my bread-making repertoire with Armenian choereg. This recipe popped up in a search for traditional Easter bread and it called for anise and mahleb--a spice I'd never heard of before but found in a Middle Eastern grocery in Dearborn (thanks, again Katherine) and it's Armenian. There's something about the holiday that reminds me of Armenia--something about the ancient, visceral, ritualis that surround it. Something about dark churches and robed priests and lit candles. It just feels right.

So I made some for brunch tomorrow and for our neighbor downstairs. And for the primary kids who will get one tiny loaf and an egg hard-boiled with red onion skins and a lesson about Jesus and the way everything testifies of Him.

On Friday I went with James to our ward's Elders Quorum v. YM pinewood derby. James was busy with his thesis (progress! He's sent a draft in and we're feeling great about it) so didn't have tons of time to put a car together, but also he intentionally went low effort--if it wins, we only spent 15 minutes on it, and if it loses we only spent 15 minutes on it. This is solid logic, but I was a little stressed--offering to paint it or wrap it in a page of his thesis or something. For some reason I imagined this conversation taking place between 15 year old James and 15 year old Kjerstin, which helped put it in perspective (I have some glitter!). We had a great ROI--we usually took about 3rd place, but we couldn't win against the fellows with CO2 cartridges strapped to their blocks.

Wood block, 2 lb dive weight, rubber bands, and last-minute graphite lube.

On Saturday we made soft eggs with buttery herb-gruyere toast and raspberry macaroons, because Smitten Kitchen is taking over my life right now (more approachable than 101 Cookbooks, always witty and delicious) and it was conference weekend=an excuse for an event. Then we spent a lot of hours watching conference (so much about family this time around!), took a walk, washed some dishes.

This week we also saw Jonah Lehrer speak in downtown Madison. I wanted to be blown away but wasn't. I know Lehrer from RadioLab--he's the sort of intellectual who mixes nueroscience with, like, Bob Dylan and comes away with some lovely meditations on the human brain and sometimes humanity. I love this stuff. I listen to RadioLab a lot a lot and fit it into most extended conversations--what I mean is, I think it's cool to mix and match art and science. We did come away with some good pointers: 1. Give kids a lot of latitude in choosing where they want to excel. He said "Choose easy, Work hard" which is, figure out what kids (you) are excited about--decide to do the thing that sounds like the most fun, and then work work work. I've heard this before, and I like it. 2. Aha moments come when you're not expecting them to come, but we're pretty good at knowing when there's something on it's way.
Yes. It was a fun night out. That ended at Trader Joe's. Win and win.

One other thing: I married a really lovely man. James and I have had an awesome week, I think mostly because I've had a chance to take care of him and serve him a little. I'm wary of the "love is an action verb" cliche, but it's a real thing: love is born out of helping--doing laundry and dishes and reading over rough drafts even though a part of you is still *very* conflicted about reading over rough drafts. Conference and a blessing and some good snuggly conversation later and I'm feeling hopeful and excited about our future. And, more than that even, confident that I'm only going to get more excited about our future as time goes on.
All of that paragraph was true, but what I really wanted to write about it how lucky I feel that James has found and is pursuing his passion. I'm surrounded by a lot of people who are smart and motivated but who aren't here for the passion, but every night I get to go home and talk with James about theories and big names in his field and his big ideas for making the field (and families) better. For someone who's spent her whole life flip-flopping dissatisfied-ly from aspiration to aspiration, James' focus and enthusiasm is so satisfying. I'm looking forward to our future, in part, because though I don't know what's coming I know that we're looking in the right direction. 

Loves,
keb

This week started great and ended great. There were some rough patches in the middle (like, for instance, the entire middle, which I spent in Detroit), but that's how it goes I think.

The run-down:
Last Sunday we had a really good conversation about what our goals are and what we're doing and can do to accomplish those goals (thus the cryptic email). James is a really good man. I'm really glad I'm married (at all and to him). We have a lot of things to learn, but I think that's sort of the point.

Detroit wasn't actually bad at all. I did some presentations. I ate some delicious food. My customer team is awesome and the weather was *amazing*.

James got some good work done on his thesis. Go James go! It's been rough/is still rough, but I think we're getting some good momentum.

We had the missionaries over for dinner Friday. J made Massaman (his specialty. Very delicious.) And the elders are very nice and awesome. I'm a big fan.

Yesterday we went on a lovely run (separately because I learned to run by myself and because J eats marathons for breakfast which stresses me out). We run by corn fields and forest and cow pasture and lake. Wisconsin is crazy beautiful.

Not all the way ready for Monday, but getting there. The end.

Ideal blogging conditions:
Evening. Solitude. Headphones+tunes. An unpleasant and not entirely overwhelming task at hand. And here we are. :)

A story I'd like to tell: a friend of mine is a wonderful poet. She started writing seriously about the same time I did, but unlike me, she kept writing seriously through an MA and an MFA and a lot of applying to a lot of programs. And now she's on her way to law school.
And I think it's safe to say, even if she's reading this (hey there eg), that she isn't or wasn't, like, the kind of off-hand stereotype of a poet at all. Like, she's all business. Like she came to poetry via editing. Law school is an incredible fit and she'll be wonderful at it and if you would've asked me, when I first knew her, where she'd be right now I'd choose law school over poetry any day.
And both parts of her are important, and the one enlightens and brightens and adds interest to the other I think, in a really satisfying way.

The reason I'm telling you this story (which kind of isn't mine to tell) is because I've been feeling the tug of the inexorable lately and this story really brought that tug to light. I feel like on my way to getting where I want to go right now, in feeling out the way, my (our, now) path is swerving back to my beginnings.
And where a year or two or five ago I would've resisted this, I would've, maybe, applied for graduate school instead of sticking with teaching, for instance, or even moved to Salt Lake for a year instead of going on a BYU study abroad, I'm seeing something really sustaining and beautiful and firm and true about circling back, about shedding some of the layers--no, that's not it--because I don't regret the roundabout way I took--but, having the experience I do and having developed the perspective I have, I feel really ready to take on the roots of me. To start to embrace the life I was presented with 10 years ago and start living that life.

The end.

boringtitleweekinreviewblahblahblah

So, to start: I hear it's snowing in Utah. Here in the midwest, we've been enjoying freakishly unseasonable weather. We're supposed to get up near 80 this week. It's been wonderful: windows open, summer-dress wearing, barbeque-smelling wonderful. It will snow again, but for now, I'm basking.

Yesterday we celebrated the season by vacuuming, dusting, and washing the winter out of our little apartment.

We're also getting a foot-up on gardening for the summer (I get a little garden plot through work, and I'm anxious to get my peas in) and are pretty stoked for our (very small) basil starts:

Last weekend was a little more festive, we went out to Racine (about 2 hours east) with our friends Amanda and Frank. We were looking for good rye bread for Frank who's here for a couple of semesters from Denmark (Racine is supposed to have a huge Danish community). The closest we came was some sort of suspect (also some sort of delicious) pastry.

We also stopped off at a lighthouse on Lake Michigan. It was windy and a little chilly and a lot of beautiful.

Finally: Did you guys know that acorn squash came in *miniature*?

They do. And are adorable. And delicious with lentils.

Bullet Blog

(Annie, I'm stealing it.)

• Here are some pictures of our house:

The kitchen

 Our hallway!

 And the living room

 James is apologizing that it's messy. But it's a little messy.

We love our little place. It's two bedrooms above a mom, her boy, and their cat. It's little and cute and has some personality, and was redone by a bachelor with ok taste, so the carpet's nice and the kitchen's tiled and the walls are neutral. Sort of the perfect scenario. Oh, and the rent is good.

We live in the downtown-ish part of Mt. Horeb, just a block behind Main St. Our front door looks onto a little lane/alley that our neighbors backyards open onto, so in the summer we have great views of gardens and backyards (also parking lots).

• We made this cool thing: 

 

What happened was that I fell in love with this upside-down planter and bought it on sort of a whim. When it came in the mail, it was much smaller than I anticipated, so looked a little funny just hanging by itself (a group of them would be very cool). Also James was worried about the integrity of our ceilings which, to be fair, are plastery and occasionally questionable). So we put our heads (and James' Christmas drill) together and came up with this. I like looking at it so much And what you maybe can't see is the way the bark nestles right up against the pine block. So polished-looking.

• So there are recipes, and there are recipes. The first are good for, you know, a little out-of-the boxing and they're fine and whatever. On the other hand are those recipes that, like, change the way you look at food: like the time I made this Colombian chicken soup that had me mixing beef and chicken stock and cumin and thyme for the next year. Or this recipe. Dill and horseradish? Horseradish and sour cream? Why had this never happened before? In my mouth? We made them for Christmas dinner (paired with ham because I couldn't resist) and ever since every potato I eat has horseradish and sour cream and dill
• Our house has a ladybug infestation. I didn't know this was possible, but these guys are all over the place.

The end.