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Exalted Ground: Poems of Praise and Lament for the Living
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Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews
April 7, 2025
To put it mildly, these are the prayers for all our yearning hearts. Kimberly Phinney has written the collection of poems that my heart has needed to hear ever since I began my journey of holding joy and sorrow both in tension and in tandem. I wish I could have read this years ago (but how grateful I am to read it now). I have needed someone to tell me that “knowing isn’t most Holy” but that “just beholding” is where God’s mercy collides with our laments (“I Bow”).
I genuinely believe that all readers, whether accustomed to reading poetry or not, will take heart in these poems. Learning to praise AND to lament is a human experience to which we are all called at some point (or many points) in our lives, and Kimberly gives us words to ponder and pray when our own don’t seem to suffice. Traces of Christ and grace leak out from the seams when we are breaking, and she masterfully captures it through words.
I leave you with several more favorite lines (of so, so many):
“And when time runs down,
and we have done all the living
we could summon,
we will be wrapped up in the stars
and taken Home.”
—The Night Sky Diaries
I genuinely believe that all readers, whether accustomed to reading poetry or not, will take heart in these poems. Learning to praise AND to lament is a human experience to which we are all called at some point (or many points) in our lives, and Kimberly gives us words to ponder and pray when our own don’t seem to suffice. Traces of Christ and grace leak out from the seams when we are breaking, and she masterfully captures it through words.
I leave you with several more favorite lines (of so, so many):
“And when time runs down,
and we have done all the living
we could summon,
we will be wrapped up in the stars
and taken Home.”
—The Night Sky Diaries
April 7, 2025
Kimberly writes with a fierce gentleness that both honors the ache of suffering and points unwaveringly toward hope. Her reverence for the hidden places is astounding - the unseen, unglamorous moments where endurance is holy and hope is hard-won. She writes to the weary in a way that makes you feel seen & held.
This book has met me again and again with words that I’ve desperately needed. If you’re a poet, a creative, battling chronic illness or mental health struggles, in need of encouragement or searching for a book that makes you feel seen - Exalted Ground is for you.
This book is a holy echo, a trusted trail marker in this sacred, unmarked terrain of life.
This book has met me again and again with words that I’ve desperately needed. If you’re a poet, a creative, battling chronic illness or mental health struggles, in need of encouragement or searching for a book that makes you feel seen - Exalted Ground is for you.
This book is a holy echo, a trusted trail marker in this sacred, unmarked terrain of life.
February 17, 2026
Exalted Ground is a thoughtful and steady collection of poetry that invites readers to live more awake to both beauty and sorrow. Kimberly Phinney writes with clarity and restraint. Her poems move through praise, lament, longing, and wonder without exaggeration or sentimentality.
Readers who appreciated her earlier work will find the same vulnerability here, but with deeper grounding. Nature serves as more than backdrop. It becomes a teacher and a witness. The landscapes she describes feel lived in rather than imagined. In that sense, her work stands in conversation with poets like Mary Oliver and Wendell Berry, honoring creation as a place where God meets us in ordinary days.
One poem in particular, “I Bless Them All,” dramatically changed my life.
The poem reflects on the practice of blessing not only what is easy or beautiful, but also what has been painful. It does not deny harm or minimize loss. Instead, it quietly suggests that blessing can become a form of freedom. Reading it shifted something in me. It helped me see that I could release bitterness without rewriting my story. I could speak life over what had wounded me without pretending it did not hurt.
That realization affected how I pray and how I remember difficult seasons.
Throughout the collection, Phinney guides readers through the valley and toward light, but she does so honestly. She does not rush hope. She allows it to emerge naturally from reflection and trust. The poems encourage attentiveness to breath, to dirt, to shadow, and to the steady presence of God within them all.
Exalted Ground is a collection for readers who want poetry that is reflective, rooted, and spiritually thoughtful. It reminds us that holiness is often found close to the ground, in the daily work of paying attention, grieving honestly, and choosing to bless.
Readers who appreciated her earlier work will find the same vulnerability here, but with deeper grounding. Nature serves as more than backdrop. It becomes a teacher and a witness. The landscapes she describes feel lived in rather than imagined. In that sense, her work stands in conversation with poets like Mary Oliver and Wendell Berry, honoring creation as a place where God meets us in ordinary days.
One poem in particular, “I Bless Them All,” dramatically changed my life.
The poem reflects on the practice of blessing not only what is easy or beautiful, but also what has been painful. It does not deny harm or minimize loss. Instead, it quietly suggests that blessing can become a form of freedom. Reading it shifted something in me. It helped me see that I could release bitterness without rewriting my story. I could speak life over what had wounded me without pretending it did not hurt.
That realization affected how I pray and how I remember difficult seasons.
Throughout the collection, Phinney guides readers through the valley and toward light, but she does so honestly. She does not rush hope. She allows it to emerge naturally from reflection and trust. The poems encourage attentiveness to breath, to dirt, to shadow, and to the steady presence of God within them all.
Exalted Ground is a collection for readers who want poetry that is reflective, rooted, and spiritually thoughtful. It reminds us that holiness is often found close to the ground, in the daily work of paying attention, grieving honestly, and choosing to bless.
April 25, 2025
I adored reading Exalted Ground. May it be a treasure for anyone to turn to during genuine moments of pain and suffering, worship and wonder…all the while knowing that Kimberly Phinney, her words, as well as God, bear you witness in the journey of both heartbreak and heart song – in any journey of enduring and eventually praising the hard and holy soul growth which is the experience of our humanity. Kimberly’s tender soul traverses mountains from despair to delight, and throughout, delightful insight blossoms. Written with exquisite skill and the echo of earlier era wordsmiths, her poems bless with powerful prayers and anthems to inspire you to sing from your own tiny perch of exalted ground. Covering themes of Praise, Lament, Wonder, Search, and Create, Exalted Ground has such depth for daily indwelling and breadth for all seasons, making tribute to and revealing God who sees you and awaits you right where you are. Kimberly Phinney’s prayerful partnership with Him through words reveals and paints poetry’s newest, freshest hue.
April 12, 2025
Kimberly’s Phinney voice is melodious yet fervent as she laments, praises, and gives thanks in all things to the God she so loves. Her beautiful poems are tender and courageous, written from the exalted ground of everyday life amongst valleys and mountains, suffering and joy, where out of the weary comes strength. A wounded warrior who has answered God’s call to pour into other wounded ones. I am immersed in these tender and courageous poems written for us. I invite and encourage you to pick up a copy today. This book is a blessing, making our days and nights easier on this side of Heaven. Thank you, Kimberly, for tending to our hearts.
June 24, 2025
Have you ever read words that have harmonised so well with your own soul's voice that you just smile?
Kimberly can put words to deep truths and crack them wide open to the light so that we can truly see.
Exalted Ground is a generous journey into the heart of one who lives with honesty. Kimberly's words will peel back layers and allow you to see more clearly what God does when we pay attention to the world and to our own hearts.
Exalted Ground will make you want to walk in the forest, look up at the clouds or into the face of another, to take notice of small things and see what treasure from the Father is there for you.
Kimberly can put words to deep truths and crack them wide open to the light so that we can truly see.
Exalted Ground is a generous journey into the heart of one who lives with honesty. Kimberly's words will peel back layers and allow you to see more clearly what God does when we pay attention to the world and to our own hearts.
Exalted Ground will make you want to walk in the forest, look up at the clouds or into the face of another, to take notice of small things and see what treasure from the Father is there for you.
April 18, 2025
"Kimberly Phinney's poems have taken on an urgency and wildness in her second collection Exalted Ground. Her words are radiant, like alpine wildflowers gathered or a lantern in darkness, and as a humble reader, I feel as though she's written them just for me. What a gift for the faithful, the seekers, the broken, the healing, and for the wild ones."
-Nicholas Trandahl,
award-winning poet and outdoorsman, author of Purgatory and Cabin Sketches
-Nicholas Trandahl,
award-winning poet and outdoorsman, author of Purgatory and Cabin Sketches
June 24, 2025
Like a “gentle, but fierce” guide, Kimberly Phinney puts words to feelings, helping us find our own; my favorite kind of poetry. She paints masterpieces with imagery from her personal life through a journey of seasons: praise, lament, wonder, search and create. You will find yourself here in one or many. I’ve read through it twice already and bought copies for friends.
Too many favorite poems ear marked in this collection to list them all, but I especially loved “Sea of Stars”.
Too many favorite poems ear marked in this collection to list them all, but I especially loved “Sea of Stars”.
June 25, 2025
I'm an avid reader, but poetry is new territory for me. I was inspired to get Kimberly's latest collection "Exalted Ground" from following her writing on Substack, and I was not disappointed! Her poems are beautiful, heartfelt, and accessible to newbies like me. This collection draws from her real-life experience with chronic illness, but the themes she unpacks are universal: our need for love, beauty, connection, belonging, healing, art, and God. You won't regret picking up a copy!
April 27, 2025
Kimberly’s poetry holds the holy and the hard in both hands, and Exalted Ground emerges from this beautiful tension. In a culture that over- or under-emphasizes the struggles of life, these words of hope push against the shallow platitudes and place the experience of the reader in the good grip of the one who calls us beloved. In these poems you will find that you belong.
June 23, 2025
Kimberly’s words cover the full spectrum of emotion - from praise to lament, and I will return to them many, many times. The observations that form her poetry are creative and poignant, and her words cut as deep as the pain and healing that formed them. I often felt like I was living her experiences with her, as she manages to put her heart and soul right into the pages of this precious book.
December 30, 2025
The poems in Kimberly Phinney's Exalted Ground read like modern day Psalms. They don't shy away from the hard and messy and painful; at the same time they offer an encouraging balm of comfort and hope to the soul. Exalted Ground is a beautiful testimony witnessing to the goodness of God in the middle of the storm. I will be going back to these poems again and again.
April 19, 2025
Kimberly Phinney has a way of writing in a raw and vulnerable way, holding nothing back about the hard, and yet leaving the reader filled with hope. Her faith and love of nature shine in this latest collection.
May 2, 2025
Kimberly is a phenomenal writer and poet. I'm thankful for her beautiful words and heart. Many of these poems resonated with me deeply. If you know the pain of chronic illness, depression, or other struggles, you'll especially find yourself in these pages. In Exalted Ground, you'll find hope.
May 9, 2025
This collection of poems was such a treat. Phinney has a way with words- much of it resonated deep with me.
Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews