Finally. An actual day of rest. One of my favorite pleasures in life is sitting down with some coffee to read a good newspaper. So today, on the way home from church, I bought a NY Times and lounged around with my wife all day, reading. Nice.

I've been reading a new book of poems by Jane Hirshfield, and it is just great. I admire the way in which she is able to pinpoint human urgencies with a calm probing; her sure lines and solid images make these poems resonate in my mind. This is part of one of my favorite poems so far:

"What is usual is not what is always.
As sometimes, in old age, hearing comes back.

Footsteps resume their clipped edges,
birds quiet for decades migrate back to the ear.

Where were they? By what route did they return?"


Cynthia Nielsen has an interesting post on reading that she is doing on Luther (a book, evidently, by Heiko Oberman (sounds like one of the Finns currently doing much Luther research these past few years). I am attempting to fit her report into my own thinking about Luther (from assigned reading & lectures here in seminary). I will formulate something more substantial soon.