A Poem, a Poem, my Kingdom for a Poem…

A Poem, a Poem, my Kingdom for a Poem                                           Written by the Hobbit

Growing up my mother read poetry to me. I can still easily tell you what happens in “Wynken, Blynken, and Nod” or “The Duel” (which is perhaps better known as “The Gingham Dog and the Calico Cat”). But somewhere along the way poetry faded. Perhaps it was because I am a rational thinker. Perhaps it was because I had to learn about structure and rhyme, and that learning did not include the joy of simply experiencing the poem. Poetry briefly came alive when our youngest child was in kindergarten. It was the annual Christmas program, and all of the elementary grades sang a couple of songs and the older kids acted out the Christmas story. This year the kindergarten class sang a Christmas carol I had never heard before….

    What can I give Him, poor as I am?                                                  If I were a shepherd, I would bring a lamb;                                      If I were a Wise Man, I would do my part;                                        Yet what I can I give Him: give my heart.

I teared up hearing these very young kids sing these words. So, I went home, did a little research, and found that the words come from “In the Bleak Midwinter”, a poem by Christina Rossetti, one of the greatest Victorian poets. And it is also a Christmas carol – much of the music of our faith, bold old and modern, is poetic in nature.

But then it faded again. Recently I have begun to ask myself, “Am I missing something by not reading poetry? If so, what is it that I am missing? And why is this important?”

To answer those questions, I went to How to Read the Bible as Literature” rel=”noopener noreferrer”>How to Read the Bible as Literature (and get more out of it) by Leland Ryken. I knew there was a lot of poetry in the Bible – but I did not know that it is the second most used literary form in the Bible. Ryken notes that the following are all or almost all poetry: Job, Psalms, Song of Solomon, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes (the entirety of the wisdom books), Isaiah, Hosea, Joel. According to Ryken, “There is no book in the Bible that does not require the ability to interpret poetry…” (emphasis mine). Poetry is a HUGE part of our faith.

So, my first step is to begin to understand Biblical poetry. The second is to find great poetry that is based in faith (and there is a LOT of that – like the Rosetti poem above). And, as I mentioned, there is a huge amount of lyrics – and also prayers – that are poetry or make extensive use of figurative language.

In doing this I will attempt to highlight things that I think will work on a family basis – and also age specific. There are also going to be a great many theological topics to consider. So feel free to come along with me as I embark on this adventure of discovering a world that I was largely missing……We will post a few updates on our Theological Thursday posts!

If you are a fan of poetry- what’s your favorite poem??

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