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How the Stars Get in Your Bones: A Book of Blessings
Her work has been described as “breathtaking” by the Chicago Tribune. Now Jan Richardson returns with a new collection of blessings that go deeper still into what she has become known blessings that do not shy away from our human experience but enter into the full range of it.
With poetic honesty, How the Stars Get in Your Bones turns toward the hard things that each of us the grief, loss, fear, and weariness that we live with. In her distinctive style, Richardson invites us to perceive what makes its home here, the joy, solace, grace, and, most of all, the love that moves through it all, illuminating and transforming what seems most hidden or hopeless.
“A blessing has the ability to enter into our pain,” Richardson writes in the opening pages, “not to dismiss or gloss over it but to name it, and to name also the love that connects us and holds the love that is continually working for our wholeheartedness.”
These blessings welcome us wherever we are, offer us a space of healing for as long as we need, and call forth our courage, that our broken heart might become a path back into the world.
To keep turning your heart
toward this unendurable earth,
knowing your heart will break
but turning it still.
I tell you,
this is how the stars
get in your bones.
—From the blessing “How the Stars Get in Your Bones”
Born of Richardson’s deep knowing of grief and love, these blessings are a luminous gift to savor and to share.
With poetic honesty, How the Stars Get in Your Bones turns toward the hard things that each of us the grief, loss, fear, and weariness that we live with. In her distinctive style, Richardson invites us to perceive what makes its home here, the joy, solace, grace, and, most of all, the love that moves through it all, illuminating and transforming what seems most hidden or hopeless.
“A blessing has the ability to enter into our pain,” Richardson writes in the opening pages, “not to dismiss or gloss over it but to name it, and to name also the love that connects us and holds the love that is continually working for our wholeheartedness.”
These blessings welcome us wherever we are, offer us a space of healing for as long as we need, and call forth our courage, that our broken heart might become a path back into the world.
To keep turning your heart
toward this unendurable earth,
knowing your heart will break
but turning it still.
I tell you,
this is how the stars
get in your bones.
—From the blessing “How the Stars Get in Your Bones”
Born of Richardson’s deep knowing of grief and love, these blessings are a luminous gift to savor and to share.
- GenresPoetrySpiritualityPrayer
135 pages, Kindle Edition
Published December 8, 2025
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
March 11, 2026
Love all things Jan Richardson!
January 7, 2026
Beautiful, as her work always is.
January 27, 2026
HOW THE STARS GET IN YOUR BONES
A Blessing
Sapphire, diamond, emerald, quartz:
think of every hard thing
that carries its own brilliance,
shining with the luster that comes
only from uncountable ages
in the earth, in the dark,
buried beneath unimaginable weight,
bearing what seemed impossible,
bearing it still.
And you, shouldering the grief
you had thought so solid, so impermeable,
the terrible anguish
you carried as a burden
now become—
who can say what day it happened?—
a beginning.
See how the sorrow in you
slowly makes its own light,
how it conjures its own fire.
See how radiant
even your despair has become
in the grace of that sun.
Did you think this would happen
by holding the weight of the world,
by giving in to the press of sadness
and time?
I tell you, this blazing in you—
it does not come by choosing
the most difficult way, the most daunting;
it does not come by the sheer force
of your will.
It comes from the helpless place in you
that, despite all, cannot help but hope,
the part of you that does not know
how not to keep turning
toward this world,
to keep turning your face
toward this sky,
to keep turning your heart
toward this unendurable earth,
knowing your heart will break
but turning it still.
I tell you,
this is how the stars
get in your bones.
This is how the brightness
makes a home in you,
as you open to the hope that burnishes
every fractured thing it finds
and sets it shimmering,
a generous light that will not cease,
no matter how deep the darkness grows,
no matter how long the night becomes.
Still, still, still
the secret of secrets
keeps turning in you,
becoming beautiful,
becoming blessed,
kindling the luminous way
by which you will emerge,
carrying your shattered heart
like a constellation within you,
singing to the day
that will not fail to come.
A Blessing
Sapphire, diamond, emerald, quartz:
think of every hard thing
that carries its own brilliance,
shining with the luster that comes
only from uncountable ages
in the earth, in the dark,
buried beneath unimaginable weight,
bearing what seemed impossible,
bearing it still.
And you, shouldering the grief
you had thought so solid, so impermeable,
the terrible anguish
you carried as a burden
now become—
who can say what day it happened?—
a beginning.
See how the sorrow in you
slowly makes its own light,
how it conjures its own fire.
See how radiant
even your despair has become
in the grace of that sun.
Did you think this would happen
by holding the weight of the world,
by giving in to the press of sadness
and time?
I tell you, this blazing in you—
it does not come by choosing
the most difficult way, the most daunting;
it does not come by the sheer force
of your will.
It comes from the helpless place in you
that, despite all, cannot help but hope,
the part of you that does not know
how not to keep turning
toward this world,
to keep turning your face
toward this sky,
to keep turning your heart
toward this unendurable earth,
knowing your heart will break
but turning it still.
I tell you,
this is how the stars
get in your bones.
This is how the brightness
makes a home in you,
as you open to the hope that burnishes
every fractured thing it finds
and sets it shimmering,
a generous light that will not cease,
no matter how deep the darkness grows,
no matter how long the night becomes.
Still, still, still
the secret of secrets
keeps turning in you,
becoming beautiful,
becoming blessed,
kindling the luminous way
by which you will emerge,
carrying your shattered heart
like a constellation within you,
singing to the day
that will not fail to come.
January 20, 2026
I tell you, this blazing in you...
...comes from the helpless place in you
that, despite all, cannot help but hope,
the part of you that does not know
how not to keep turning
toward this world...
I tell you,
this is how the stars
get in your bones.
This new book of blessings from Jan Richardson is a balm, both in the darkness and the light, both personal and universal, intimate and expansive. A book for times of despair and of hope. I know that I will return to it often.
...comes from the helpless place in you
that, despite all, cannot help but hope,
the part of you that does not know
how not to keep turning
toward this world...
I tell you,
this is how the stars
get in your bones.
This new book of blessings from Jan Richardson is a balm, both in the darkness and the light, both personal and universal, intimate and expansive. A book for times of despair and of hope. I know that I will return to it often.
February 28, 2026
Sister Lucy was reading this at the priory so I bought myself a copy. Thought I would read it over lent but I couldn’t put it down. It’s a beautiful blessing in itself full of hope and wisdom. What a gift to have blessings to bestow on those in need. I love the stars and find my time under the stars on the mountain in reflection to be the most sacred of spaces, so I love the title. God is in the stars and in each blessing freely given.
May 1, 2026
Deeply resonant
Jan Richardson’s artful words and images are deeply resonant with my own life, at times, showing me parts of myself that I had not yet met, and doing so with wisdom, gentleness, and compassion. I am always grateful to be able to sit at home with her art and deeply ponder.
Jan Richardson’s artful words and images are deeply resonant with my own life, at times, showing me parts of myself that I had not yet met, and doing so with wisdom, gentleness, and compassion. I am always grateful to be able to sit at home with her art and deeply ponder.
May 26, 2026
A moving collection of poetic blessings with rich imagery. I especially appreciate the honesty and solace found in the way she handles tender topics.
May 27, 2026
Beautiful! Definitely a keeper!
July 7, 2026
A collection of poems/blessings. Each entry quite similar format. Useful for events like wedding, child leaving home, etc.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews