Slowly, I digest the thoughts and experiences of the “Love Bade Me Welcome” conference at Yale Institute of Sacred Music. Much of what happened the first two days, I allowed to wash over me, to fill me, and not get stuck in notes. Those thoughts and experiences will need to resurface in other ways, perhaps in poems or worship.

Yet I did take some notes on the second day, and more on the third day. Often, they were just of phrases that caught my attention, so I’ll share them here, mostly just as is.

“Agony of a civilization which seems to have lost its coherence.”

“Come to a conference on poetry and theology not to escape the world but to explore it more completely”

“The landscapes of the heart gave us great art as well as The Third Reich”

“The divinity’s in the details.”

“To teach is to learn twice”

“Embrace ambiguity, not vagueness”

“Addicted to certainty”

Another part of my notes are of people to read and resources to explore.

Poetry Foundation’s Poem of the day – Added this to Doggcatcher on my smartphone

A Year of Being Here “daily mindfulness poetry by wordsmiths of the here & now”

Psalm 88

Mary Karr (particularly her Descending Poetry)

Anthony Wilson – Livesaving Poems.

Garrison Keillor’s Writer’s Almanac - Also subscribed via DoggCatcher.

Commonweal Magazine apparently often has poetry.

For theological sources, Frederick Buechner, Walter Brueggemann (particularly "Finally Comes the Poet") Garrett Green (particularly “Imagining God: Theology and the Religious Imagination”) and Evelyn Underhill

Amos Wilder (Thornton Wilder’s brother)