Irreantum 14.1 (part two)

.

The language of the poetry of Javen Tanner

This poetry engages the challenge presented by James Goldberg a couple issues ago. (Listen to a verbal draft here.) Briefly, his point is that scripture provides LDS writers vast quantities of allusions to connect with their LDS readers. Tanner has accomplished this task with aplomb. Consider this third stanza from "Genesis":

And the water he called blood. And the darkness, night.
The warm night of darkness was parted from the blood.
And this is how it was: the darkness bled out light.

I wish I could quote the whole poem, but know that it constantly plays with the creation language of Genesis is unexpected ways, sometimes with lightness, sometimes with stabbing.

Keep an eye on his blog. "Sweetwater may show up.

The Jesus of Lisa Madsen Rubilar's poetry

Here too the poet is exploring stories and language we already have intimacy with. I wasn't much impressed with the first poem, but, like "Sweetwater", I wish I could simply reproduce "Just Telling It Like It Is" and "A Day in the Life of Jesus" and discuss every line, word, phrase.

To keep it brief, "Just Telling" is a description of Jesus from those nonaccepters who nevertheless stil love the boy they once knew. Suddenly, the sound uncomfortably like the people we are each week at Church, sometimes confusing motes and beams. "A Day in the Life" moves into the sometimes awkward second person and makes that awkwardness a strength; beginning with the line "You learn that your cousin John is dead", the poet forces us into Christ's position and thus recognize just how difficult his life was. As a work of midrashim, it is phenomenal. Prepare to understand Him as maybe you have not before.

The interview with Tyler Chadwick

Or you could just buy his book and discover the marvels he uncovered for yourself.

Borders as explained by Scott Hales

A very helpful way to understand how Mormons interact with the world. But I'm not going to be able to sum it up in a couple paragraphs.

Bradford Tuckfield compares Borges to Lewis

I was unsure what Tuckfield meant by Mormonism having a vulnerable God until a couple days later when I heard the Givenses speak on the same topic. But his main point was that Borges as Mormon as C.S. Lewis, although for completely different reasons. It seems like a thesis worth exploring further.

Melissa Dalton-Bradford mourns

And it is painful to read, but I left this essay feeling more capable of love and empathy. And our faith requires us to mourn with those who mourn, and so this essay made be a better Saint.

On Monday, we'll return to this issue of Irreantum one last time and talk about, wait for it, S!E!X.

/subscribe/