The Wonder Paradox: Embracing the Weirdness of Existence and the Poetry of Our Lives

by Jennifer Michael Hecht

Religion once formed the rhythms and structures of marking time with calendars, carving out space for contemplation, creating connection, reinforcing legacy and morality. Now, for many, religion no longer runs the show. So where shall we find our magic? How do we celebrate milestones? Which texts can focus our attention but still offer space for inquiry, communion, and the chance to dwell for a dazzling instant in what can’t be said?

The answer, Jennifer Michael Hecht—the historian, poet, and bestselling author of Doubt—tells us, is poetry. In twenty chapters built from years of questions and conversation with those looking for an authentic and meaningful life, Hecht offers ways to excavate the useful aspects of tradition and to replace what no longer feels true.

Through cultures and poetic wisdom from around the world—Sappho, Rumi, Shakespeare, Issa, Tagore, Frost, Szymborska, Angelou, and others—she blends literary criticism with spiritual guidance rooted in the everyday.

Linking our needs to particular poems, she helps us better understand those needs, ourselves, and poetry. Our capacity for wonder is one of the greatest joys of being human; The Wonder Paradox celebrates that instinct and that yearning. Like Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way and Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird, it promises to inspire generations.

Genres: Poetry, Nonfiction, Self Help, Philosophy, Religion, Audiobook, Writing

Audible Audio

First published March 7, 2023

About the author

Jennifer Michael Hecht is a poet, historian, philosopher, and author.

Reviews

[Reading_ Tamishly · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thank you, Farrar Straus and Giroux, for the advance reading copy.

I find this book quite unique.

From the blurb, I expected this book to be in poetry format throughout mulling on various topics of life in general.

But what a surprise I am into!

The book has four main sections in which the writing is in the form of essays representing the opinion of the author on topics of decision making and the themes of everyday practices of sleeping, meditation; on being grateful and such.

The author has some very valid questions on the holidays we celebrate; the various rituals we perform; on topics of morality and the various social practices we live with.

I would say the entire book won’t take up much of your time. Read it when you want to have some valid answers you want to give yourself. This one is a thought provoking one I say!

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

I will steal a notion from the first line of Jennifer Michael Hecht’s preface to her delightful book, The Wonder Paradox: Embracing the Weirdness of Existence and the Poetry of Our Lives. She says, “I didn’t mean to write this book.” Well, in all honesty, I didn’t mean to read this book! I’m uncertain of Ms. Hecht’s reason for not meaning to write it, but at least two of my reasons for not meaning to read it are: first, it appears to be liberally sprinkled throughout with the word religion (which I abandoned over fifty years ago in favor of undiluted atheism); and second, it is about poetry (with which I have a strained and reluctant relationship at best).

But nevertheless, Ms. Hecht did write this book, and I did read it!

The first reason that prompted me to read it was a comment by the author on a radio show. I’m paraphrasing wildly, but she said something to the effect of: “Poetry is meant to use language in weird and wonderful ways. It is meant to be read and re-read, and readers are expected to be open to having different reactions each time, or a cumulative reaction that builds one layer at a time with each reading.” Or something like that. The fact that I (almost) never re-read anything could well be my failing to connect with poetry. A further reason for reading the book was how early the author’s mischievous sense of humor jumped out at me. Apart from her quirky preface opening line about not meaning to write this book, her introduction begins:

“I was raised as an “atreeist,” in a New York-based antiarboreal coven. I’m kidding. Sort of.”

Then, she stumbled onto an affecting quote by Rainer Maria Rilke, “whoever she was” Ms. Hecht muses, and when Rilke turns out to be a man, Hecht says, “a bummer for a bookish girl.” Lastly, she admits to being a poetic realist which, apparently, translates reassuringly into her being “a science-and-reason person” (or atheist in my book!)

Hecht believes that “Poetry can help us make up for the loss of the supernatural, can connect us to one another and to meaning in our lives.” To that end, she encourages readers to “compile a clutch of poems,” and in The Wonder Paradox, she purports “to show you how to gather and get to know them, how to take them into your daily life and your heart.” To make all this easier, Hecht assembles 20 essays in groups of five under situational themes: Practices, Holidays, Life Celebrations, and Emergencies and Wisdom Questions. So, for example, Holidays includes On Happier Holidays, On Sabbaths and Fools’ Days, and On Earth Day and Rebirth, whereas Life Celebrations includes On Weddings, On Welcoming Babies, and On Coming-of-Age.

Each essay, then, poses a specific situation faced either by other people or by Hecht herself. She selects a poem to address the situation, derives insights from the poem, suggests how religion and art and science helps, offers a poetry lesson, and finally provides guidance on identifying and “gathering” a poem for one’s personal collection. Hecht offers a glut of food for thought, although I would have favored a teensy-bit less presumption in the titles of a couple of repeated segments in each essay, namely, “How Religion Might Help” instead of “How Religion Helps,” and “How Art and Science Might Help” instead of “How Art and Science Help.”

As is usual with poetry-centric work, my likes and dislikes are sharp and firm. For example, I didn’t care much for On Eating, whereas On Sleep resonated with me, and I was on the fence with On Meditation. Additionally, shorter was better; I sometimes found Hecht’s poem selections and related analyses too long. Naturally, I loved On Choosing a Code to Live By, and the related “instructional” poem, “O May I Join the Choir Invisible,” by the intellectual powerhouse, George Eliot. However, in this same essay, she links Eliot’s poem to the British TV show Monty Python’s Flying Circus, hailing it as “arguably as the funniest thing in the twentieth century.” I must disagree with Ms. Hecht on that one, having lived in England for 20 years, including the period when Monty Python aired. I found the show somewhat corny, boring, and juvenile; having seen one episode, further viewing offered little that was new.

Nevertheless, Ms. Hecht’s book does a great service to poetry readers, since she draws her selections from a vast and rich global source, and though some classic poets were known to me (Shelley, Wordsworth, and Dickinson), many more modern ones were not (Antonio Machado, Ada Jafarey, and Nazim Hikmet). Throughout, Hecht’s writing is lively and engaging and thought provoking. As readers delve deeper into the book, the repeated structural pattern of each essay will afford them a pleasant sense of familiarity and a comfortable anticipation of what to expect next. This makes for a brisk reading pace, but readers need not fear in reaching the end, for The Wonder Paradox is a book to return to again and again with renewed interest and pleasure.

[Megan Bell · Rating 5 out of 5]

In this warm and wise invitation to a poetry-enriched life, atheist poet and historian Jennifer Michael Hecht shows us how to gather our own collection of poems for daily practices, holidays, celebrations, and even emergencies, all through exploring how world religions, art, and science address the subject of each chapter, introducing a relevant poem, and offering a poetry lesson—from alliteration to Japanese list poems to Romanticism and beyond.

[Gijs Limonard · Rating 3 out of 5]

Loved the concept, in the end it's a bit too drawn out, this could've been condensed in a more handsome volume.

[Courtney]

This just wasn't what I was hoping it would be.

(That sounds rather poetic, no? 😂)

[Elisabeth · Rating 5 out of 5]

e-ARC obtained via Edelweiss+

An absolutely beautiful book for those seeking to have words to lean on as well as understanding the ones that most do. Covering religion, art and science, modern and ancient poets, and much more, the book encourages the reader to seek out words that bring them comfort and guidance through many life situations, feelings, and holidays, with advice on not necessarily needing to follow the traditional words that are often used, rather pushing them to find their own words, own poems that resonate.

Highly recommend for those looking for guidance as well as those who just love poetry and seeing the influences poetry have on our lives.

[Kathryn · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a wonderful book for poetry lovers, the poetry curious, atheists, agnostics, and anyone looking for some secular contemplation or nondenominational spiritual support. Each chapter takes on a theme of a different life event and provides historical context and sample poems for how people have and how we now can make meaning or live with mystery. It's carefully researched, clearly written, and practically oriented. I can see myself consulting it again many times in the future.

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for the digital ARC.

[Erica Greene · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am rating this book solely on the content and not my personal opinion because although for the right person this would be a fabulous read, it's just not for me. I agree with Lisa's comment that this is not a book that is meant to be read through but a book to reference when the need arises. I read a few chapters and it is written so that anyone can read and digest the poems with thoughtful insight. I love that she dissects the poems, but thought this would have been more poetry less life story if that makes sense. Living in the south but from the north this book was a breath of fresh air from the religion fueled world around me, so that aspect is great as well. This makes a great reference for the non-religious and an eye opener for the religious.

[Kaz Ogino · Rating 5 out of 5]

Everything I enjoy in a book about poetry; questions and wonder of life, poetic techniques and keen analysis about selected exemplary poems... and lots of selected extraordinary poems.

My second reading made the book a bookshelf keeper for me. There is so much in it to think about and explore for a long time.

[Po Po · Rating 5 out of 5]

Inspirational. Motivated me to write my own poetry.

[Sonja · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really loved this book. It is a great introduction to poetry with stories and thoughts about ritual in place of religion. I love the poems Jennifer Michael Hedge chooses and how she urges us to keep poems at our side for comfort and advice. The author is an atheist and she is open about it. There is so much one can learn from this philosophical wonder of a book. Thank you for The Wonder Paradox.

Part of Walt Whitman’s preface to the Leaves of Grass is only one poetic piece that’s quoted: “This is what you shall do;
Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown or to any man or number of men, go freely with powerful uneducated persons and with the young and with the mothers of families, read these leaves in the open air every season of every year of your life, re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul, and your very flesh shall be a great poem and have the richest fluency not only in its words but in the silent lines of its lips and face and between the lashes of your eyes and in every motion and joint of your body.”

Walt Whitman - Preface to ‘Leaves of Grass’ 1855.

[Afreen Khalid · Rating 5 out of 5]

A rather lovely book about how poetry can fill the meaning-void in our lives, filled with analyses of poems by some of my favourite poets including Wislawa Szymborska, Walt Whitman, T.S. Eliot and Emily Dickinson. I gave it an extra star because it recognizes the brilliance and beauty of Urdu poetry as well.

[Sasha · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ultimately I think I learned here that I need to have books like this in my hand and not attempt them as audiobooks, I had a really hard time locking in for the first like 4 hours. I would give this a 3.5/5 if i could because the anecdotal/preachy parts of it sometimes lost me but the more academic work is soooo good. I ultimately went for 4 stars here because she cites such good poetry and breaks it down mostly really well. I am not sure if i’m inspired to build all of the rituals she suggests but I’m definitely going to be more mindful about the role poetry plays in my life. If you’re thinking about reading this I really suggest listening to her episode on the grey area podcast (which i think is so good) first and if you like it then give this a go!!

[Cheryl · Rating 4 out of 5]

The thing is, a lot of nonreligious philosophy in the past has been too shocked by the loss of religious meaning to notice that there is meaning all around us, and too angry at religion to want to retain any of its behaviors. But surely religion is a human creation to organize human needs for celebration, gathering, meditation, inspiration, and comfort. Many nonbelievers see this and participate in some religious behaviors, for love and fun, even without the light of the believers. That disconnect can feel unnecessarily stressful. The mistake we are making is that the light was always a combination of poetry and ritual.

Not exactly what I expected, but enjoyable nonetheless. I knew so many of the poetry and use them in a similar way as the author, but also discovered some new ones.

Poetry takes in our whole outrageous situation as ambitious mortals, hanging curtains in a sandcastle nursery in the shade of a rising wave (kiss the baby, glance at the wave). Art pushes us away from the everyday, the worldly, and toward transcendence. By “transcendence” I mean the feeling of being at one with the universe in vivid bliss that is, by wide report, available to humans—though hard to find, keep, or handle.

I think vivid bliss is something I had no idea how to access and something I have been painstakingly trying to share with others through words and images, that vitality of a skill or talent that lives in so many and lies dormant, and some of these poems can help those who want ceremony, who need it to feel connected and feel so betrayed by religious traditions.

So maybe some of us don’t believe in the spirits that once seemed to be the electricity that lit up all the traditional rituals. Poetry though, available to all, is a sufficient source of power to light up ritual and guide us toward meaning. It’s as if we have lamps but won’t plug them in because our ancestors believed electricity was spirit-made. Having lost belief in spirits, we sit in the dark. There’s no need. We have holidays and rituals, crafted like tungsten and glass for glowing. We have poems that buzz with electric charge. Let’s plug them in.

“Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.” —Rainer Maria Rilke

The insight that we solve life’s questions by living, solved me; as did the new awareness that this Rilke, whoever she was, felt the way I did. As I stood reading that swatch of paper, the effect was immediate. You can love the questions. You can live your way into new knowledge, but you have to give it time.

“O Me! O Life!
BY WALT WHITMAN
Oh me! Oh life! of the questions of these recurring,
Of the endless trains of the faithless, of cities fill’d with the foolish,
Of myself forever reproaching myself, (for who more foolish than I, and who more faithless?)
Of eyes that vainly crave the light, of the objects mean, of the struggle ever renew’d,
Of the poor results of all, of the plodding and sordid crowds I see around me,
Of the empty and useless years of the rest, with the rest me intertwined,
The question, O me! so sad, recurring—What good amid these, O me, O life?

Answer.
That you are here—that life exists and identity,
That the powerful play goes on, and you may contribute a verse.”

"Islands" by Muriel Rukeyser,

O for God’s sake
they are connected
underneath

They look at each other
across the glittering sea
some keep a low profile

Some are cliffs
The Bathers think
islands are separate like them”

I use poetic sacred to express sacred feelings that are not religious. Anthropology and sociology often use “the sacred” to explore what people “hold sacred.” Etymology supports nonreligious usage, tracing all the way back to the Proto-Indo-European ‘seh k-‘, meaning “to sanctify, to make a treaty.” Words and acts invoked at sacred times become enchanted with memory and can carry the sacred elsewhere, to hallow new ground.

The wonder paradox is the miracle that we are blown away by the experiences of consciousness. Religion and art invite us to a world bigger than normal life, into contact with the weirdness of our human situation. We live within paradoxes. We feel permanent though well aware of death. The consciousness paradox is the startling fact that soft matter afloat in a bone bowl made Mozart’s sonatas, Shakespeare’s plays, and the whole astounding modern world.

My favorite paradox is the one about wonder, the sublimely curious fact that we evolved, materially, as beings equipped with the ability to feel awe…With our white coats on we might explain why we crave beauty, noting that facial symmetry signals a healthy partner, but explaining it doesn’t explain it away. We still live these feelings. Part of the paradox of wonder—for me and by wide anecdotal report—is that thinking about it feels true, feels worth one’s time. Considering our contradictions and embracing the weirdness of existence feels, when you are doing it, as if it is a valuable thing to do. Poetry can help us to do it.

“Caminante, son tus huellas
el camino y nada más;
Caminante, no hay camino,
se hace camino al andar.
Al andar se hace el camino,
y al volver la vista atrás
se ve la senda que nunca
se ha de volver a pisar.
Caminante, no hay camino
sino estelas en la mar.


Traveler, your footprints
are the only road, nothing else.
Traveler, there is no road;
you make your own path as you walk.
As you walk, you make your own road,
and when you look back
you see the path
you will never travel again.
Traveler, there is no road;
only a ship's wake on the sea.
Antonio Machado”

The road taker is real, though the road isn’t. Roadster, there’s no road. Walker, there is no walk. Path taker, there’s no path. Goer, there’s no going. Way follower, there’s no way. Why does this move me? A lot of people hear an inner call to service that is out of sync with any outer call from the world so far. Not everything is available to everyone, all the time, so in one way or another, we all may be natural-born skiers in a land without snow. Born singers but there is no song…If there is no road, there is no other road—nothing to miss out on. “Traveler, There Is No Road” can help you escape from the lines on the map altogether and the limitations they place on you.

Okakura Kakuzō wrote a treatise called The Book of Tea in 1906, in English. He put the beauty of Taoism into poetic terms that Westerners could understand, and radically improved how the West viewed the East. He was Japanese, educated in Chinese classics as well as English. Here’s how the opening essay starts: “Tea began as a medicine and grew into a beverage. In China, in the eighth century, it entered the realm of poetry as one of the polite amusements. The fifteenth century saw Japan ennoble it into a religion of aestheticism—Teaism. Teaism is a cult founded on the adoration of the beautiful among the sordid facts of everyday existence. It inculcates purity and harmony, the mystery of mutual charity, the romanticism of the social order. It is essentially a worship of the Imperfect, as it is a tender attempt to accomplish something possible in this impossible thing we know as life.”

“From Blossoms
BY LI-YOUNG LEE
From blossoms comes
this brown paper bag of peaches
we bought from the boy
at the bend in the road where we turned toward
signs painted Peaches.

From laden boughs, from hands,
from sweet fellowship in the bins,
comes nectar at the roadside, succulent
peaches we devour, dusty skin and all,
comes the familiar dust of summer, dust we eat.

O, to take what we love inside,
to carry within us an orchard, to eat
not only the skin, but the shade,
not only the sugar, but the days, to hold
the fruit in our hands, adore it, then bite into
the round jubilance of peach.

There are days we live
as if death were nowhere
in the background; from joy
to joy to joy, from wing to wing,
from blossom to blossom to
impossible blossom, to sweet impossible blossom.”

We are going to eat “not only the skin, but the shade.” The reader’s brain provides the missing sensible options not only the skin, but the fruit and not only the sun, but the shade. See how “fruit” and “sun” were hidden words? You do the next line. Try “not only the sugar, but the days.” Fill in words that seem expected or reasonable here: Not only the sugar, but the _______; and not only the days, but the _______. What kind of words are hidden?

Lee spoke about the meaning of his work and his devotion to poetry. I believe that aesthetic presence, aesthetic consciousness, is the wholest or highest form of presence we can achieve. It sacralizes what we observe, or what we attend to. It makes sacred, I shouldn’t say “makes sacred,” it uncovers the sacred nature of our lives. Uncovers the sacred, because you don’t project it, you don’t make it sacred, it is sacred.

“Wild Geese” distinctly rejects the religious worldview of penance, with you as the penitent, and life as a long crawl. Inside the poem you are not bound to religion nor to pretending life is better than it is, but you are also not in control. Stop thrashing. The lone human action in the poem is sharing despair, a part of the natural sacred. The geese take us up high, where we can see a little more. Reading the poem has you say “wild” three times. Let the communal-meal poem be warm, let it call to a better life that is right here beneath our normal noticing. Poetry can invoke the public poetic sacred. Even when everything feels impossible.

Religion is full of ways to say Thank You; it is one of the major categories of prayer. Meister Eckhart, the Catholic mystic of the fourteenth century, wrote, “If the only prayer you ever said in your whole life was ‘Thank You,’ that would suffice.” Consider too the title of a book by the insightful spiritual writer Anne Lamott, Help, Thanks, Wow, which she calls the three essential prayers.

A Muslim teaching that gratitude has three levels. It is good to feel grateful in your heart. It is better to put it into words. Best of all is to spend your gratitude helping others.

The Mahabharata describes how to be grateful through generosity to strangers, secretly, including planting public orchards so that weary travelers can benefit from the succulent fruit and the cooling shade. What a grand way to give a gift and be well away before the day it gives sweet succor to some stranger who will never know your name.

Dying in 43 BCE the Roman statesman and scholar Cicero lived before the birth of the leaders of the two largest religions on Earth, Jesus and Muhammad, and he could see that “A thankful heart is not only the greatest virtue, but the parent of all the other virtues.”

Inger Christensen: “alphabet” excerpt
1
apricot trees exist, apricot trees exist

2
bracken exists; and blackberries, blackberries;
bromine exists; and hydrogen, hydrogen

3
cicadas exist; chicory, chromium,
citrus trees; cicadas exist;
cicadas, cedars, cypresses, the cerebellum

4
doves exist, dreamers, and dolls;
killers exist, and doves, and doves;
haze, dioxin, and days; days exist, days
and death; and poems exist; poems, days, death

5
early fall exists; aftertaste, afterthought;
seclusion and angels exist;
widows and elk exist; every
detail exists; memory, memory’s light;
afterglow exists; oaks, elms,
junipers, sameness, loneliness exist;
eider ducks, spiders, and vinegar
exist, and the future, the future

6
fisherbird herons exist, with their grey-blue arching
backs, with their black-feathered crests and their
bright-feathered tails they exist; in colonies
they exist, in the so-called Old World;
fish, too, exist, and ospreys, ptarmigans,
falcons, sweetgrass, and the fleeces of sheep;
fig trees and the products of fission exist;
errors exist, instrumental, systemic,
random; remote control exists, and birds;
and fruit trees exist, fruit there in the orchard
where apricot trees exist, apricot trees exist
in countries who warmth will call forth the exact
colour of apricots in the flesh.

Griots, or jeli, are West African poet-singer-historians. Old empires of immense might, gilded and poetic, have reigned for centuries and fallen out of name in this area. The age of the Mali Empire was circa 1235–1670; the Manding languages were spoken here and their culture spread wide and far. In the hands of an extraordinary player like Sibo Bangoura, or Sona Jobarteh and her band, the kora is exquisite. Griots sing praise poems and poems of gratitude.

Night Piece by Mark Strand
For whatever reason, people are waking.
Someone is cooking, someone
is bringing The Times to the door.
Streets are filling with light.
My friends are rubbing the sleep from their eyes.
Jules is rubbing the sleep from her eyes,
and I sit at the table drinking my morning coffee.
All that we lost at night is back.

Thank you, faithful things!
Thank you, world!
To know that the city is still there,
that the woods are still there,
and the houses, and the humming of traffic
and the slow cows grazing in the field;
that the earth continues to turn
and time hasn’t stopped,
that we come back whole
to suck the sweet marrow of day,
thank you, bright morning,
thank you, thank you!

“As If to Demonstrate an Eclipse,” by Billy Collins

I pick an orange from a wicker basket
and place it on the table
to represent the sun.
Then down at the other end
a blue and white marble
becomes the earth
and nearby I lay the little moon of an aspirin.

I get a glass from a cabinet,
open a bottle of wine,
then I sit in a ladder-back chair,
a benevolent god presiding
over a miniature creation myth,

and I begin to sing
a homemade canticle of thanks
for this perfect little arrangement,
for not making the earth too hot or cold
not making it spin too fast or slow

so that the grove of orange trees
and the owl become possible,
not to mention the rolling wave,
the play of clouds, geese in flight,
and the Z of lightning on a dark lake.

Then I fill my glass again
and give thanks for the trout,
the oak, and the yellow feather,

singing the room full of shadows,
as sun and earth and moon
circle one another in their impeccable orbits
and I get more and more cockeyed with gratitude.

A Jain prayer before sleep is brief, cheerful, and focused on others. It also subtly yet powerfully broadens one’s sphere of interest.
May all be happy.
May all be healthy.
May all achieve perfection.
May all be blessed.

Meditation practice, or dhyana, began in ancient India and became a feature of many of humanity’s major and minor religions. Earliest mentions of dhyana are in the Vedas, the oldest religious texts on Earth. Meditation was born with poetry—the Sanskrit root of “dhyana” is Dhi, relating to the goddess of wisdom and poetry.
It’s an internal war for many of us, at times, the question of whether our red-dress (risk) quotient is the right way to spend our lives. It is a paradox of the human experience that travel and adventure seem best, and so does staying put and creating (a family, a contribution, roots). That’s just the deal. You can be ripped apart by it, or not be—by practicing gratitude that you got any life at all, that you got one in.
You wake up tomorrow morning and can’t find anyone, anywhere. By all indications, you are alone on the planet. What do you do?

Things I Didn't Know I Loved by Nâzim Hikmet (excerpt)

it's 1962 March 28th
I'm sitting by the window on the Prague-Berlin train
night is falling
I never knew I liked
night descending like a tired bird on a smoky wet plain
I don't like
comparing nightfall to a tired bird
I didn't know I loved the earth
can someone who hasn't worked the earth love it
I've never worked the earth
it must be my only Platonic love
and here I've loved rivers all this time
whether motionless like this they curl skirting the hills
European hills crowned with chateaus
or whether stretched out flat as far as the eye can see
I know you can't wash in the same river even once
I know the river will bring new lights you'll never see
I know we live slightly longer than a horse but not nearly as long as a crow
I know this has troubled people before
and will trouble those after me
I know all this has been said a thousand times before
and will be said after me
…
I just remembered the stars
I love them too
whether I'm floored watching them from below
or whether I'm flying at their side
I have some questions for the cosmonauts
were the stars much bigger
did they look like huge jewels on black velvet
or apricots on orange
did you feel proud to get closer to the stars
I saw color photos of the cosmos in Ogonek magazine now don't
be upset comrades but nonfigurative shall we say or abstract
well some of them looked just like such paintings which is to
say they were terribly figurative and concrete
my heart was in my mouth looking at them
they are our endless desire to grasp things
seeing them I could even think of death and not feel at all sad
I never knew I loved the cosmos
snow flashes in front of my eyes
both heavy wet steady snow and the dry whirling kind
I didn't know I liked snow
…

[Diego Dotta · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was a beautiful surprise. I downloaded a sample to my Kindle, and by the second page, I was compelled to buy it. The book uses poetry as a medium to explore themes such as self-connection, rituals, and faithfulness, offering a break for the mind.

One of many interesting notes is a quote that particularly resonated with me: “I love sleep because it is both pleasant and safe to use. Pleasant because one is in the best possible company and safe because sleep is the consummate protection against the unseemliness that is the invariable consequence of being awake. What you don’t know won’t hurt you. Sleep is death without the responsibility.”

This passage beautifully captures the essence of the book's exploration of the subconscious and the peace found in disengagement from the waking world.

[Stephanie Dargusch Borders · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book because the author, Jennifer Michael Hecht, did a conversation last week via Literati with Maggie Smith, author of the phenomenal new memoir You Could Make This Place Beautiful. The conversation was absolutely wonderful and inspiring and I urge you to look for it on the Literati YouTube page.

I’ve only recently started reading poetry again due to some literary prizes. I quickly realized that I wanted to make space for poetry in my daily reading. It wasn’t much later that I stumbled on this book and author and I just loved how the book tied everything together for me. I found so much inspiration in these pages and I love that one of my favorite poems, one of a few poems in college that lit a spark in me, Ozymandius. The spark was a bit forced, since I had to memorize and then recite it to the entire class. 😅

Anyway, bottom line, this is a book you’ll want to add to your personal collection.

[Kennedy · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5

This book was useful and unique—finding poems for events, most that are usually considered religiously secular, and using this to lead personal values and collective insight. It covered many different cultural standpoints and experiences, which I found to be quite interesting. A lot of the author’s experiences I felt could have been omitted, but other than that, I am left inspired to begin a collection/book of poetry to have reference to when needing guidance and inspiration.

[Kristina · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked it because we do indeed need new ways to say what we mean. I didn't finish it because I'm distracted in my life right now, but I chose to add the book to our library's memorial collection because I thought that my husband and I would have had some interesting conversations about it, had he read it. Instead, I trust others will enjoy and find something meaningful in it.

[Addis Olive · Rating 4 out of 5]

A different genre for me, but loved her open minded insight into a range of topics covering love, death, celebrations, and all the other things that come with life. Good introduction into all things poetry!

[Bejinha · Rating 2 out of 5]

Nice idea: what if poetry could replace some of what religion and its prayers do?

But it didn’t deliver to me. I found it better in Poetry Remedy.

[Grace Heymsfield · Rating 2 out of 5]

I finished this book because I’m a completionist. Unsold by the premise but glad poetry as religion works for the author

[Lisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

For many, religion gives guidance for everyday living and for special occasions or events. In this book, the author gives people an alternative to that structure, using poetry. Each chapter covers an event or situation, giving pertinent poetry that can be memorized or used during that time. She gives some background on how religion, art and science help in the particular situation; she offers her poem for that occasion, along with some history or a poetry lesson. Then she gives guidance for finding your own poem. This isn't really a book to be read from front to back; rather it's one you could read piece-by-piece as the need arises. At times, I felt I was in a college course, but there were some lovely passages and poetry, also. Many thanks to NetGalley, Ms. Hecht, and the publisher for the ARC of this title, which releases in March 2023.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

I tried to read a chapter of this at a time rather than the whole way through, which helped. I think it's a book to dip into at appropriate times, and I liked the idea of it so much that I've started making a record of what our family does to celebrate, mourn, commemorate, etc. Some of the tangential writing could have been hemmed in a bit and the poems selected were hit and miss with me, but I appreciate this book.

[Jen b b · Rating 4 out of 5]

I like how this author has organized each chapter — the poems she uses as examples/models are some favorites of mine as well, I like that she ends each chapter suggesting how readers should go about finding a poem of whatever type to suit whatever occasion—and add it to their own personal poetry collection.

[Logan Spader]

Stopped on page 37. I really enjoyed some of the poems and I LOVED the idea of getting to know more about this style of art but I realized I just didn't have enough interest in the subject to read an entire book about it. I may come back... (p7 good poem, p8 quote about the point of life)

[Nicole · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good overall. I don't agree with some of the details pertaining to Christian theology, but the author does a good job of offering ideas for bringing meaning into various life events no matter your belief system. It would be a useful resource for hosting interfaith or non-faith events.

[Denise · Rating 5 out of 5]

I don't actually like poetry, as in reading poetry, but I really enjoyed this book and hearing the narrator express the authors love of poems. I realized that I prefer poems that are done in the form of songs.

[Addison · Rating 5 out of 5]

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
This collection was a beautiful and moving experience, filled with heartfelt verses that resonated deeply. Each poem felt like a glimpse into something raw and true, making it a joy to read and reflect on!

[Nilendu Misra · Rating 4 out of 5]

“The poetry Lessons” were darn good. Lot of good ideas interspersed too, like - “religion is needed to talk about death”, “we are all genius when we dream”, “each man’s memory is his private literature” and many more.

[Oliver · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some of the chapters were 4 stars and some were 2 stars. I almost gave up on this several times, but kept with it. I appreciate the effort to provide atheists with ways to connect and celebrate life's moments.