Catherine Lawton takes a holistic view of faith.

Faith poetry has a long history, extending back at least to the Psalms of the Old Testament of the Bible and likely even earlier. What’s almost curious, but understandable, is how contemporary poetry has separated, largely if not entirely, into secular and religious streams. It’s a mirror of the culture at large, but not everyone mimics that mirror.

But not every poet has followed that divergence. Some take a more holistic approach, integrating all of life in their poetry. One of those poets is Catherine Lawton.

Lawton is an author, essayist, and a poet. She’s published numerous books, including fiction, memoirs, non-fiction works like Write and Publish Organically, and poetry collections such as Glimpses of Glory. Her newest poetry collection, Where All Things Meet, Mirror & Mingle, reinforce her recurring poetic theme of life and faith as a collective whole.

Many of the poems are directly about faith. Many are about nature, life, writing, conflict, and emotions. But all are viewed through the lens of Lawton’s faith. This poems begins like a nature poem, and then it moves into something else entirely.

Holy Stillness

There is no heartbeat
in a seed—
Yet life waits
in that brittle encasement
as surely as in the stilled
breathing and slowed
beating heart
of toads and salamanders
in winter deeps and
sleeping bears in caves.

Waiting, waiting, we wait
in lengthened nights and
chilled soil and cloistered suns
for warmer, lighter, moister days
to dawn.
From on high—and pulsing
in the depths—we hear
“Wait… Wait… Be still…”
and “Coming—
I have, I am, I will.”

She writes with a gentleness and even a meekness, a meekness that combines humility and gratitude. Her poems are quiet ones; they don’t shout, because that’s not the point. The poems are the echo of a life lived through faith.

Lawton received her B.A. degree in English from Point Loma Nazarene University and a Master of Science in Management (MSM) degree in faith-based publishing from Northwind Theological Seminary. She is a founder of Cladach Publishing, and she posts regularly at Glimpses of Glory in the Unfolding Story on Substack.

You read a collection like Where All Things Meet, Mirror & Mingle, and you realize you have met a whole person. Lawton doesn’t wear her faith on her poetic sleeve; she has donned the entire garment, and it fits.

Related:

Religion and Poetry Do Mix – and Mix Well.

An Anthology of Contemporary Catholic Poetry.

Photo by Andy Walker, Creative Commons, via Flickr. Post by Glynn Young.

Browse more book reviews

Buy How to Read a Poem Now!

How to Read a Poem uses images like the mouse, the hive, the switch (from the Billy Collins poem)—to guide readers into new ways of understanding poems. Anthology included.

“I require all our incoming poetry students—in the MFA I direct—to buy and read this book.”

—Jeanetta Calhoun Mish