Issue 6

APRiL 2025

AS SURELY AS THE SUN LiTERARY

 AS SURELY AS THE SUN
LiTERARY JOURNAL

ISSUE VI | APRiL 2025

Copyright © 2025 As Surely As the Sun Literary

surelyasthesun.weebly.com
e-mail: [email protected]
 CONTENTS

Editor’s Note 6

POETRY

Jacob Quinlan
Love Rocks 8

Emma Galloway Stevens

Vengeance is the Lord’s 9

Christian Alexander Barkman

I Saw Him Come to God in Madness… 10
The Lamb At the Passion 11

Mark Trisko
Essential Requirements For Resurrection 13

Jacob Curran
Beneath the Edicule 15
Samson and the Paramour 17

Jennifer Schuldt
Sunset, Parking Lot 21
Song For the Broken 23

Cherry Harvard
Saving My Secrets For a Deaf Man 24
12 Years, A Touch 26
Rachael Carson
Son of Man 28

Tim Gavin
Divine Property: An Alter 30
Divine Property: Apple Seeds 31
Divine Property: Crumbs 32

Kirsten Lasinski
What the Women Saw 34
The Door 35

David Athey
Your Initial 36

Wayne Bornholdt
An Inch and an Eternity 37

Rebecca Nacy
And It Was Very Good: Reflections At Horseshoe Bend 39

Nicole Hirt
Window to Eden 40

Liz Jakimow
Larger Than the Mountain 41

Esther Ra
In Your Hands 42
Still Life With Beating Heart 44
Testimony 45
Jake Lane
The Longest Nights When Everyone Seems to Know We’ve Once Again Fallen Short 49
All Parts of Myself 50

Johnna Ryan
Christening 54

ViSUAL ART

Jacob Bredle
Hummingbird cover

Lynn Wolfe
Window to the Soul 20
Crosspoint 21

Michelle DiSarno
The Sunrise From on High 39

Hannah Grace Greer

The Tree of Life 51
The Trinity 52
The Four Elements 53
EDiTORʼS NOTE
…

Am I a God at hand, declares the Lord, and not a God far away? Can a man hide himself in
secret places so that I cannot see him? declares the Lord. Do I not fill heaven and earth? declares the
Lord.
~ Jeremiah 23:23-24 ~

As you read through the following pages of the sixth issue of the As Surely As the Sun literary
journal, you will be reminded of the grace of God’s nearness. It is in our nature as fallen
creatures to try to run from God’s presence, to flee from His sight. But the truth, as God
Himself declares in the verse above, is that there is no place we can go to hide from Him. We can
only find rest from our running when we stop and surrender.
The poetry and art in this issue depict the struggle that proceeds this surrender and the
peace that follows; they capture the tumult of our hearts apart from Christ and the fulfillment
thereof when we at last fall at His feet.
It is with immense gratitude and humility that I present these works of the sixth issue of
As Surely As the Sun, to the glory of the God who is near to us.

Soli Deo gloria,

Natasha Bredle
Editor-in-Chief
LOVE ROCKS
Jacob Quinlan

Like water shapes a cliff, so you have shaped me.

The tide, the ebb and flow of daily moments with you,
it all smooths me out. It gives me new edges,
new jumping off points, new beginnings and new ends.
Your love is making me a mountain;
had you passed me over,
I would have remained a lump of earth.
VENGEANCE iS THE LORDʼS
Emma Galloway Stephens

Turn away from the burning road

and the reeking swamp.
There’s a way that’s narrow and clear.

There’s no gold in the hills you seek,

no silver in the caverns below.
turn away from the burning road.

The burden on your back. Lay it down.

Let it sink into the ground.
There’s a way that’s narrow and clear.

Cross the river. Heal your weary feet.

Surrender to the cold, round stones.
Turn away from the burning road.

Take the uphill climb. Come out of the valley.

A few steps more will run your blood white.
There’s a way that’s narrow and clear.

Hold your father’s hand. Lean on your mother’s shoulder.

Let them lead you to the foot of the great gold ladder.
Turn away from the burning road.
There’s a way that is narrow and clear.
I SAW HiM COME TO GOD iN MADNESS…
Christian Alexander Barkman

after pantheist wishes to join

the wind, moss, and rain;

after dreams of utopia,

which set the world ablaze;

after psychedelics, nightmares,

and snake oil friends,

he at last turned to God,

in time for the end.
THE LAMB AT THE PASSiON
Christian Alexander Barkman

Push through the wicked crowd

To behold the blood and bone
Of the blameless man from Galilee
Who struggles on alone—
Draped in the blood of his passion.

The lashes at the pillar

Dye red his holy fleece,
The thorns that pierce his skull
Do crime to love and peace—
Of which he’s prince and captain.

The imposition of the wood

Upon the shoulder ripped and torn,
That exceeding pain he bore
With mildness, without scorn—
Upon the road to martyrdom.

At the final act, the tide of blood

Soon to fail,
He poured forth from his side
Water and wine—
A sign of his unending mercy.

There are not tears enough

To honor what was given,
Nor match in stream
The love poured out:
The power that whipped
The primordial flood,
Contracted now to human debility,
To pay redemption by blood.
ESSENTiAL REQUiREMENTS FOR RESURRECTiON
Mark Trisko

The sky fell dark on a late April afternoon

changing from a hazy blue to a steel gray full of blackness,

and the wind hastened, shaking the trees and forcing

my shoulders to hunch together. The rain came hard

and fast, sideways, and slashed my cheeks through the

upturned hood of my sweatshirt as if it was nothing, not real

but only a ghostly veil. There was no protection from

this spring reversal, from this disquieting feeling. I tried hiding

at the edge of the garage but the storm had found me and in doing so,
had sensed my fear and marked me for suffering. The attack came

more ferociously now, trying to uproot me from my shelter.

A few, decayed and unattended leaves left sitting

on the garage floor through the winter, were sucked outside

and they spun in eccentric spirals up and down the driveway,

powered by the sudden squall, and I was one with the leaves,
whirling through life without control, unseen and unassuming,

unable to decide, flowing where the wind blows fleetest,

following along unchosen. The dark clouds turned blacker

and the hackles on my neck rose to greet them. And I saw

the shadow of death with his bloody, sharp sickle flying across the sky.
Is it coming for me? I am not ready yet. It is not time
for the destruction of my body, not time for me to begin again.
BENEATH THE EDiCULE
Jacob Curran

Have mercy on these old walls,

A hole in the stone I am,
A cave in the Holy City.
Wipe away the gossamer
And take your rest here.
I yearn for the body.

I am frozen with the years,

Rigid as the bones of Cain,
Inert since the death of this world.
The best of me is carved away
To make room for the body.

I am dark and damp and full of filth,

But for these three days I am yours.
Not a palace but a portal,
Not a temple but a tomb,
I am the final courtesy of the living,
The hole in the Earth that needs sealing.

Do not fear the scent of herbs, of myrrh,

The stone that plugs my mouth.
Your destiny is beyond these walls,
But to hold you is my birthright,
My one hope, my salvation.

So lay here.

Give me the body.

Until every stone sings,
Until the mouth moves,
And the rock walls cry out,
“Hosana! Hosana! Hosanna in the highest!”
A thousand years like three days—

I’m sure you won’t be long.

SAMSON AND THE PARAMOUR
Jacob Curran

I am Delilah,
Continents away from you,
My beloved Nazirite.
With the scattered beats of the city behind,
Amidst the roar of urban chaos
I forget my God for my love of wealth.
I am hidden from my own affections.
Come.
Find me in the tallest tower
Pouring over spreadsheets to feed my family.
Concrete pillars of a temple, they are
Built for the worship of some unholy god—
Paramour that I pay homage to,
Who feeds me when I plow his field,
Who nurtures seeds of my resentment
And loves my distraction,
My blindness at work,
Who loves when my ears are stone deaf and cold,
When my vocal cords do not ring out.
Sing to me Samson.
Do not relent until I turn to you,
Faithful and free.
Leave no stone unturned, no idol unbroken.
Never again let your melodies cease
Until every bone of mine is covered
In sinew and flesh,
The means of movement,
Until pulse of life is rediscovered.
Let the thrum of your voice, and beat of the drum
Rattle the base of this sanctuary,
And should I die as it crumbles to dust
Should I be extinguished with all that I know,
With the destruction of greed and false prosperity,
Hold me close to you, my love.
Let me feel heat of your breath on my skin
And your arms around me one last time.
WiNDOW TO THE SOUL
Lynn Wolfe
CROSSPOiNT
Lynn Wolfe
SUNSET, PARKiNG LOT
Jennifer Schuldt

I saw heaven standing open

~ Revelation 19:11 ~

Ocean rollers of color held us transfixed,

the sun submerging in earth, ablaze with
uncommon glory on an ordinary day

brought on by a storm south of the store,

where I stopped in the bustling lot,
beneath a wall of cloud, amethyst and blue,

citrine cumulus, a glowing band chartreuse,

morphing before me, slow kaleidoscope,
a burning aquarium of color framed only

by the limits of widened eyes, unbound

by the laws of sunset, which require paling
past the boiling point of every neon—

this pulsed on in maybe the way it will be

when You come back and most expect nothing
but sutures for the torn sky and disregard

the flexed nostrils and the horse’s piaffe,

most packing up after long hours of labor
funneling into subways and onto highways

as the last sun descends on the tattered world.

Though some will stop and watch, like me,
a shop-worn woman ready to go home,
and the pierced man with the sleeve of tattoos
three cars over. We are the only two aghast at the sky,
glory-bombed and reveling in the altering light.
SONG FOR THE BROKEN
Jennifer Schuldt

The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit
~ Psalm 34:18 ~

Unspoken promises hang,

limp vines along this path so clear before,
now overrun.
I alone am searching
as shadows claim daylight’s place
I stammer your name into this wilderness
where wandering feels endless
parting the leaves that fail
to break love’s fall.

Sunlight streaks through trees,

last fragments landing on touch-me-nots
in the stream’s shallow valley
frilling the murk where minnows glide
shining on the current’s pull
washing slowly through me
as a hovering universe of tiny flies
weaves a dancing nest of light.
They have only moments left,
You whisper,
these living sparks,
intense as ends of lightning,
and like the worst ache,
born fleeting.
SAViNG MY SECRETS FOR A DEAF MAN
Cherry Harvard

I whispered my fears into the night,

Afraid they’d echo back,
Stronger than before.
Each secret, a stone, heavy in my chest,
Told only to the silence, to a Deaf Man
Who else could hold these fragments
without breaking?

There’s a Man who never responds,

not a twitch of recognition,
yet something in His stillness
makes the secrets safer there.
They sink into the quiet
as if it was always meant to be this way—
unnoticed, unburdened.

It feels like screaming into a void,

but the void never spits it back.
Instead, it absorbs everything,
becomes a keeper of things too heavy to carry alone,
Turned them into stories of strength.

Then it became clear,

He wasn’t listening the way it seemed—
no sound, no response,
Just a quiet knowing that lingered.
Everything spoken into the dark
was already gathered, folded into the silence,
tucked away long before
there was any understanding of its weight.

There’s peace in not being heard,

in knowing nothing has to be said
for everything to be known.
The Lord wasn’t a deaf man,
But a Holy One
Who knows my heart before I speak,
And holds my life in His hands,
With a love that silences every fear.
12 YEARS, A TOUCH
Cherry Harvard

Luke 8:43-48

Twelve years,
and no one noticed the slow unraveling.
The quiet way life pulled at the seams,
each thread loosening
beneath a gaze that never landed long enough to see.

I lived on the edges,

a shadow among shadows,
silent as the hours blurred into years.

There was a day, though,

where the air was thick with more than just dust,
where the hem of a robe held more
than it should have—
a weight that wasn’t mine to carry,
yet something I reached for
without thinking.

In that moment,
the years fell away.
Not in some grand, sweeping motion,
but quietly,
like a breath held for too long,
finally released.

No one noticed,
not really.
But I did.

And in that noticing,

something shifted.
The world was still loud,
the crowd still pressed,
but the weight was gone.

No sound to follow,
just the absence of it,
a space once occupied,
now unfamiliar,
like air that moves
but doesn’t stir.
SON OF MAN
Rachael Carson

I AM
Heavy with anguish, a man
of sorrows. I pour out my blood
in conflicted prayers—
the foreseen friction of prophecies
fulfilled, of faith forsaken.
Wake up, you selfish sleepers!
Don’t you understand
that the hour has come?
Oh, my friends,
embracing betrayal,
wrongful rage, and denial.
Abandoned and accused—
I AM.

The deafening cries,

the harsh words prevail. Despised, I remain
silent, misunderstood. A mocking
trial, three attempts at release,
three times denied.
They embrace a murderer, scorn
their savior.

I AM
Unrecognizable royalty—
a piercing crown, a mocking
robe, perfectly oppressed, holy
and humiliated, guiltless but convicted.
Your sin is heavier
than this grieving cross I carry
on my bruised back, up the painful
path to the final place
where I will make you whole.

I AM
Raised high
on this suffocating hill,
forsaken yet forgiving,
suffering and ministering. Berated by one,
believed by the other. Darkness
falls as the sun dies out.
With my last breath I give life, declaring
It is finished.
DiViNE PROPERTY: AN ALTER
Tim Gavin

Down the gangplank,

into mud still
holding its memory of flood—
a rock, heat-scoured and smooth,
sits in a bed of silt,
older than water, younger than your voice.
A pigeon shifts its wings,
half-light catching the arc—
I follow,
stone in hand,
an altar rising between breaths.
The psalms somewhere in me,
turn over and over
until they silence themselves—
a whisper waiting to be met.

Under your night—

star-sharp, distance, a weight I’ve carried—
I break the bread,
pour the wine,
as if to fill what can’t be filled.
But the crumb is enough.
The sip, too.
Your name,
caught between my tongue and the dark,
a thread refusing to fray.
DiViNE PROPERTY: APPLE SEEDS
Tim Gavin

A hurricane, ocean-escorted from West Africa,

Swept away chunks of coast, a graceful stand

of pines torn down, leaving a muddy gash—

scarring the land. In the backyard, a child snacks

on an apple while his father, at the barnwood table,

blows life into a flame, surveying the ruin,

looking for some hint of rebirth. The child,

fingers sticky, picks seeds from the heart

of the apple, carries them in his palm

to his father, who mends a hem in silence.

He invites him, the seeds in his hand—

and together they walk to the gash in the earth,

fingers working as a plough,

placing each seed, far enough to grow,

close enough where life could become more.

DiViNE PROPERTY: CRUMBS
Tim Gavin

Here I am with the birds, they perch—I am watching them—

on the top of the chapel, at the foot of the cross,
a hundred years of mourning and they’ve stayed,
murmuring something of God—
they’re saying something every day,
and I can hear them, mysteriously,
they brood and repeat and brood and repeat—
and the crumbs, the crumbs fall from a nailed hand,
they know the taste better than I do.
And I wonder. I wonder if they ever think
about the hills, the brutish ones,
The ones watching all this time,
as crumbs fall down,
fall from the Bread of Life,
torn apart and hanging there,
nailed and thorned and flogged,
stripped of dignity and hanging still,
still and silent as if in a sanctuary and
hanging still among rogues and thieves,
and the people lined on the avenue jeer—
yes, jeer, and cheer death like a lottery,
like it’s something they’ve been waiting for,
something they could eat and take home
like lamb chops wrapped in butcher’s paper
and the way they gaze at him waiting
for a miracle to unfold like a sheet,
and then—yes, then,
a man, an official, steps forward
and stabs, yes, stabs with the spear,
like it was his duty to steal the last breath away.
And the blood and water—I don’t know,
maybe I’m just too close—
but the blood and water run down,
they run into the dirt and on the people,
the ones who are standing there like they didn’t know,
and the birds—oh yes, the birds—they know,
they pick at the crumbs, always picking
and flying away, as if they know
how to transcend and leave this behind,
this whole thing, this butchery,
and soar to some other place—
how did they learn that?—to emerge
with crumbs in their beaks,
accepting the grace we refused.
WHAT THE WOMEN SAW
Kirsten Lasinski

The men called it an idle tale,

a fool’s hope like a tangled vine
knotting tendrils in the dark.
But then, some people prefer
the tomb. Some prefer their locks
rusted shut, a bent nail
to a key. Some people prefer
an idle tale, foolish women
and the certain weight
of stone. Even so, the women
testified of the tomb
swallowed up in song,
every stone of his
shallow bed singing
singing the radiance
of the vine.
THE DOOR
Kirsten Lasinski

We worship the God

of closed doors, who tenderly
gathers our failed dreams
like crumbling laurels laid
in tribute at his feet, then lifts
us up again, eager to bless that
narrow scrap of white
fluttering over the citadel
of self. Who could have
guessed his broken flesh
his borrowed poverty
would be the dream
we couldn’t ignore?
All hail the God
of the wanting grave!
At last, our open door.
YOUR iNiTiAL
David Athey

Imagine
the sacred
rite of making words

for Constantine the Great

who wanted more copies
of Holy Writ

for the Imperial Library to be

royally lit by the Light that is
ever ancient

ever new, and you,

your face
bathed in candlelight

and dewy sweat,

body trembling (for what
you’ve seen and heard)

blissfully over your initial

scribble—In the beginning
was the Word—
AN iNCH AND AN ETERNiTY
Wayne Bornholdt

Gasping for a moment of exhalation—

A cry for mercy but words,
Caught in the net, flail and twist,
Remain embedded beyond reach.

Each syllable finds itself alone, exiled—

Connotation slips, falls into vapid creases,
A pawned infraction,
An inch and an eternity apart.

Time’s promises evaded, commitments eluded,

The queasy pieties, announced in flat monotones,
This cacophony of ears bent towards heaven
But listening closely to the flesh’s panting.

I, too, am remote—stealing
A moment, a universe apart
From the Word enfleshed, the impaled Verbum,
Flayed, twisted on the coarse topography of Palestinian timber.

The words agonizing, brief—

Bear all things in utter isolation.
THE SUNRiSE FROM ON HiGH
Michelle DiSarno

Because of the tender mercy of our God, with which the sunrise from on high will visit us
~ Luke 1:78 ~
AND iT WAS VERY GOOD: REFLECTiONS AT
HORSESHOE BEND
Rebecca Nacy

radiance floats groundward

scattering sparkles of rock,
glazing on glistening streams

floating tuffs frame

turquoise skies with
blushing pink

iron layered pillar stretches skyward

rusted rocks reaching—
embraced by rushing rapids

basin water gleams,

basking in beams of warmth
washing against winter winds

plants press sunward

spotted geckos rest on rough rocks
red hawk brings balancing brown to the clouds

pure, raw goodness steals my breath

my own arms wrap to clutch side and sternum
shocked with the serious serenity
of very good
WiNDOW TO EDEN
Nicole Hirt

From the perch of a shadowy gazebo

I am rewarded with a glimpse of Eden.
Though it is not yet spring,
clusters of lantanas and roses rejoice
in the embrace of an unclouded sun;
they have never been cursed by winter’s grasp.

A fountain flows into lilies robed in purple,

and the dappled fins of koi flicker
scattering the pool’s surface into a million rings.
Flakes of food sprinkle from a lone steward’s hand,
but the koi swim on, unaware
of the bread waiting above.
LARGER THAN THE MOUNTAiN
Liz Jakimow

My petty problems and disturbances

seek to overwhelm me,
like a mountain that must be climbed,
but seems insurmountable
from my starting point.

Those concerns are meaningless

when faced with a real mountain,
towering over the landscape for millennia,
barely changed by the tiny people
who settled near its base and
built roads on its surface.

Looming larger than the mountain

is the Lord who created it,
to whom majestic, geographical features
are like miniscule, ephemeral specks.

How inconsequential my worries seem,

when faced with such a God.
How unfathomable that this God
should care for those worries too.
IN YOUR HANDS
Esther Ra

~ Psalm 139 ~

Hours, months even,

when your stark light washed over me

in waves of unbreakable pain.

Sometimes, I stayed very still,

like an insect quivering on a wall—

stretched tight, desperate,

a black blot of clenched terror.

Sometimes I ran away,

like a child wet with fear

who sits in the darkness

closing her eyes

believing she might disappear.

You know me, God:

my glut of selfish longing,

my pooled stains,
my glass heart.

You gaze into the bubbling

floor of my thoughts.

You brick me into the kiln of your hands,

you press me to pumice in your palms.
Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?

Even at my most animal—even when I burrow

into the damp earth of unfaith & forget,

even there your hand grips me fast,

make of my silence a story—

I pray, Lord, your thoughts may grow clear to me,

that I may inhale them, a mist of jeweled dew.

You who know me, who know my heart:

how can you continue to love me?

Search me, God, and sift me,

till the clumped ash of my wail fall away,

make of me a trail of clear fire, hard flame:

burning glass flowing into the sea of your name.
STiLL LiFE WiTH BEATiNG HEART
Esther Ra

[Jesus] rebuked the unclean spirit, saying to it… “I command you, come out of him and enter him no
more!” Then the spirit cried out, convulsed him greatly, and came out of him. And he became as one
dead, so that many said, “He is dead.” But Jesus took him by the hand and lifted him up, and he arose.
~ Mark 9:25-28 ~

Salvation, in the beginning, so closely resembles

death. Every time [ ] disappeared, I felt myself die
a little inside. Felt dead without [ ] to die for.
The lung deflating without something to carry.
The heart grumbling violence of its loss. I carried
[ ] until [ ] carried me: gave me weight, gave me reason
to breathe. Without [ ] I was color of whisper. A burnt house,
dry well, diamonds clattering on an icy & uninhabited planet.
Raincoat in land where drought was ongoing for years.
In English, the phrase: I am nothing if not [ ].
In Korean, the saying: Without [ ]
she would be a corpse. & yes
sometimes I’ve felt like a corpse:
unbeautiful ungraceful unseen. Oh God,
how small I can make myself be.
How wrenching, Your first work in me.
Teach me, Lord, how to exist
unslaughtered by sin or suspicion.
To eat from your hand at twilight & dawn
& know You alone are my God.
Here is my heart, Lord— the size of Your hand.
Take me, breathing yet. Make me whole.
TESTiMONY
Esther Ra

When a few friends asked me to share my testimony,

I was embarrassed, and a little afraid,
and said Probably not.

I am not like my parents, pastors in Korea,

who glow when they speak of God, describe Him
with ardor and conviction.

I’ve always wanted to live my faith

before talking about it,
and I’ve never been good at either.

I am hesitant to talk about God: like describing

a faraway mother in a foreign tongue,
there are no words to hold Him in my grasp.

My atheist friend asks, Esther, if somebody you loved

most in the world died, would that shake your belief in God?
And I have no answers, because somebody whom someone else

loves most in the world is dying every day,

and I have chosen to love an unknowable God.
He calls this a cop-out, and says, OK.

What if everyone you loved died AND Korea was nuked?

Would that do anything to your faith?
And I have no answers, just like I had no answers

when I saw my parents, two people who loved God

so fiercely they would give up their lives for Him,
hurt each other so deeply they often wanted to die.

I had no answers when I sat in the hospital room,

watching the parents of church members grow lighter
and lighter, their bodies dissolving in crematoriums to snow.

I had no answers listening to the stories of North Koreans

who lost their daughters, then their bodies, to the hell
we made of this earth; to the wars tearing the skies

of so many countries; to children grown so thin

their eyes hang in their sockets
like filaments of dimming light.

I am afraid. Of the sadness, the aloneness,

the mystery. I am afraid to die.
I am more afraid how to live.

But I know this: when I lap my tongue

in the warm hand of God,
I taste something I still call hope.

I have felt God, not only in the sun-flooded grass,

but also those long bus rides home in Korea
where sadness was so close a companion

strangers watched tears drip from my eyes.

I have felt God in hospital rooms shattered with grief,
where we held a dying woman’s hand

and prayed over her departing spirit,

and saw the ghost of a smile flutter over her lips
as she breathed her last word: Amen.
I felt God when my youngest sister,
one of the people I love most in the world,
watched a truck crash into her car so hard

all the windows exploded in a starburst of glass,

and she called me afterwards, breathless
but unbroken in her one beautiful body,

and all I could do was thank God and cry.

I felt God when I prayed for my mother,
and watched the dark curtains of her grief

open to the tender and soft child

who somehow survived within.
I am a sinner and a doubter

and a child of my generation.

I know so little
and live so far from the holy.

But I believe because I would rather

live all my life waiting
than live without anyone to wait for.

And God, how grateful I am

for those you have sent
to wait here with me.

For my faith family,

each with their trials and tribulations,
still welling with river-bright praise.

For my friends unbelieving

but so full of light,
their love a small proof of Your gaze.

The first response of everyone who met Jesus

was to run to those they loved, saying,
This is the One! Come and see!

So we come, Lord, our palms open, our hearts hungry.

In this life, which passes so swiftly,
like a midsummer night’s dream,

we dream of you, Lord.

Hear our singing.
Set us free.
THE LONGEST NiGHTS WHEN EVERYONE SEEMS TO
KNOW WEʼVE ONCE AGAiN FALLEN SHORT
Jake Lane

Can anyone see?

I’m sure we wonder while wandering through the crowd, feeling

eyes on us even if they’re not from those whose shoulders we
pass or whose wrists we bump in to.

They’ve got to see it

we say to ourselves, feeling the heat rise as the heart quickens,

palms becoming moist at the thought of our inner selves being
exposed, a permanent exposure of celluloid and sin.

I’m sorry.

We mutter it to everyone, audible only to ourselves and God

but not nearly as often to an ear or a cloud or a mirror.
Trespass after trespass seems routine even though we
continually scream

no, no, no.

Does the body simply will itself toward destruction, regardless

of the heart and mind wanting nothing to do with it? Shadows
follow our falls and make sure we’re sent over the edge,
glistening the whole way down as our souls deplete from the
judgement of our own self. There, in our ever-present stupor of
tears and shame, we feel the only hand we’ve ever needed wrap
around our shoulder, comforting us to sleep.

I’m here
ALL PARTS OF MYSELF
Jake Lane

Light finds a way through the colors

of the glass, mimics a standard
of excellence that is rarely ever achieved
by human hands.
How did we get to a point
where we rely on self-commands instead
of relying on words from He who gave us
vibrance, radiance, robustness.

I long to silence the masses.

I gaze toward the sky, wondering…

Thoughts pave the way,

leaving me engulfed
in a lake of tears.
For given to us is
the forgiveness of
so much, we call it all.
Lakes of tears
dry up, leave imprints
upon us, reminders
that we’re always close
to filling it again.
THE TREE OF LiFE
Hannah Grace Greer
THE TRiNiTY
Hannah Grace Greer
THE FOUR ELEMENTS
Hannah Grace Greer
CHRiSTENiNG
Johnna Ryan

First— God is Gracious

and I need not want
nor wish nor worry for what wonderings whisper along my steps—
Piercings and prosperity
put the same brightening on my face
for the knowing
the nearness
of glory.

Middle— Ash Tree Meadow

the hardest trunks and trees
that capture the crashing of this wide, created world—
Burrowed in bark
burying sound and betrayal
remembering the tree
that stole traitors
at reality’s reset.

Last— Little King

who reigns round the meadow
like a lord in his own light, leading recklessly, yet relenting for—
His guide above
a leader of the lords who shepherds
His little kings
as they watch over
this wishful world.
 CONTRiBUTOR BiOGRAPHiES

David Athey’s poems, stories, essays, and reviews have appeared in various literary journals and
magazines, including Christianity & Literature, Iowa Review, Dappled Things, Berkeley Fiction
Review, Windhover, Tampa Review, Relief, Seattle Review, Notre Dame Magazine, Time of
Singing, and Harvard Review. Athey lives in South Florida on a small lake with large iguanas.
His books, including Art is for The Artist, are available at Amazon.

Christian Alexander Barkman is a PhD student at the University of Tulsa studying

Renaissance and Restoration Literature. His first poetic work, Of Love and Angels: Poems for
My Fiancée (Wipf & Stock, 2023) was written as a love-gift for his wife in celebration of their
engagement.

Wayne Bornholdt is a retired bookseller who lives in West Michigan. He holds degrees in
philosophy and theological studies. He has had work published in Ekstasis, The Penwood
Review, Vita Poetica and other journals.

Jacob Bredle is a poet, cyclist, and sauna enjoyer. Reading and walking through gardens are
some of his favorite ways to spend a sunny afternoon.

Rachael Carson is a certified French teacher, with a minor in English literature, turned stay at
home mom. She is currently enjoying using poetry to explore the seasons and experiences of her
life and aims to do so in a way that is relatable to someone else.

Jacob Curran is a Catholic Poet and Musician from the Greater Seattle Area. His art probes
"the higher things" (Col 3:2) through examination of the interior movements of the spiritual
life. Follow him @jake.the.sanke on Instagram, @desperate.affections on Tiktok or bookmark
his website, desperateaffectionspoetry.wordpress.com to avail yourself of updates on his work.

Michelle DiSarno is a teacher, photographer, and poet from New Jersey. Her poetry has
previously been featured in Fathom Magazine, Pine Row Press, Humana Obscura, and The
Platform Review. She is passionate about sharing beauty through her work. She posts
photography and poetry on Instagram @inperfectwander.

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Tim Gavin is an Episcopal priest, serving as the Head Chaplain of The Episcopal Academy. In
addition to his most recent publication, A Radical Beginning (Olympia Publishers, 2023), he is
the author of Lyrics from the Central Plateau, a book of poems released by Prolific Press in
November 2018. His articles, essays, and poems have appeared in The Anglican Theological
Review, Barrow Street Review, Blue Heron Review, Blue Mountain Review, Cape Rock, Chiron
Review, The Cresset, Grow Christians, Digital Papercut, Evening Street Review, Library Journal,
Magma, Poetry Quarterly, Poetry South, Poetry Super Highway, and Spectrum. He lives with his
wife, Joyce, in Newtown Square.

Hannah Grace Greer is a writer and poet who is fascinated by nature and Christian
spirituality. She is originally from Pennsylvania and is currently studying creative writing at the
University of Iowa. Her work has been published in Eye to the Telescope, Heart of Flesh, The
Ekphrastic Review, Havik, and elsewhere. You can find her @hannahggpoetry on Instagram.

Cherry Harvard has been passionate about writing since childhood, using it as a means of
coping with life’s challenges. Now pursuing a minor in Creative Writing at Palm Beach Atlantic
University, she is a young widow and a single mother to a three-year-old. This marks her debut
in sharing her work with the world, and she finds solace in knowing her words leave a lasting
imprint through written expression.

Nicole Hirt is a writer studying English and creative writing at Palm Beach Atlantic University.
Her poems and prose have appeared in various issues of Living Waters Review. In her free time,
she enjoys wandering cemeteries, much to the confusion of the general public.

Liz Jakimow is a photographer and poet who lives in the beautiful valley of Araluen, in
Australia. After losing a loved one, her photos and poems from that initial three-month grieving
period were published in A journey with grief: exploring loss through photography and poetry.

Jake Lane is a husband, father, poet, playwright, and occasional half-marathoner. Jake's works
focuses on examining themes of identity, memory, time, and the human condition, often asking
what it means to really be here, right now. His work has been published in The Writing
Disorder, Coalition Works. and JMWW. Jake is an MFA candidate at Augsburg University and
lives in the Pacific Northwest.

Kirsten Lasinski's poetry has appeared in Copper Nickel, Ruminate, Fathom, 2River, and Time
of Singing. Moody Publishing published two of her novels, and she recently co-authored a book
on Christian discipleship called Simple Grace. She lives in Denver and enjoys hiking and cooking
for her husband and daughters.

Rebecca Nacy is a ginger born and raised as a missionary kid in Mexico, replanted in Southern
Florida. When not researching in a lab, you can find her covered in mud, measuring oysters.
While her brain thinks in STEM, her heart loves the arts like singing, tap-dancing, and of
course, writing.

Jacob Quinlan is married to his wife Christina and is the happy father of three little ones. He
makes a living as a lawyer and serves faithfully with his wife at their local church.

Esther Ra is a bilingual writer who alternates between California and Seoul, South Korea. She
is the author of A Glossary of Light and Shadow (Diode Editions, 2023) and book of
untranslatable things (Grayson Books, 2018). Her work has been published in Boulevard, The
Florida Review, Rattle, The Rumpus, PBQ, and Korea Times, among others. She has been the
recipient of numerous awards, including the Pushcart Prize, Indiana Review Creative
Nonfiction Award, 49th Parallel Award for Poetry, and Sweet Lit Poetry Award. Esther is
currently a J.D. candidate at Stanford Law School. (estherra.com)

Johnna Ryan is a poet and writer studying English at Palm Beach Atlantic University, and her
writing has appeared in Living Waters Review and Westmarch Literary Journal. She can often
be found in the wild, either at coffee shops sampling outlandish teas, or loitering at her local
library.

Jennifer Schuldt is a writer and emerging poet who savors the natural world. She lives with her
husband and two teenage children in the Chicago suburbs and teaches online courses at Moody
Bible Institute. In her spare time, she enjoys painting, reading, and taking long walks with
friends.

Emma Galloway Stephens is a neurodivergent poet and professor from the Appalachian
foothills of South Carolina. Her poems have appeared in The Windhover, Persephone
Magazine, The Nature of Things, Ekstasis Magazine, and two anthologies.

After retiring recently, Mark James Trisko heard his muses yelling loudly in the night begging
him to let their voices be heard. His work has appeared / is scheduled to appear in Valiant Scribe
Literary Journal, Spirit Fire Review, and Amethyst Review. He currently lives in Minnesota,
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with his beautiful spouse of 47 years, four wonderful children and eight above-normal
grandchildren.

Lynn Wolfe is a writer, illustrator, and English instructor. She lives in Las Vegas, Nevada with
her three dogs and two pigeons. Her work has been featured in The Dazed Starling, Authority
Magazine, and elsewhere. You can see her work at lynnwolfe.wordpress.com.