Mother’s house is not a house. Mother’s house is not a cave. Mother’s house is not a sacred text. Mother’s house is not an oven. Mother’s house is not a medicine cabinet. Mother’s house is not a song. Mother’s house is not a tree. Mother’s house is not an ocean. Mother’s house is not a…

“You’re not a good mom!” My ten-year-old daughter shouted as she stomped up to her room. “Good moms don’t throw paper plates at their children!” Of course, this declamation can be proven false. A good mother would construct a Chinese kite out of a paper plate, toss it toward her daughter at the perfect moment…

Ashley Wong’s poem “Post-Miracle” begins with empathy for the hard-hearted: “I understand now how the disciples could touch thousands / of pieces of bread with their hands and still not get it…” Without sentimentality, Wong describes the transience of a miracle and places us within this specific moment, the space after a miracle. The speaker…

And should you glimpse my wandering form out on the borderline Between death and resurrection and the council of the pines Do not worry for my comfort, do not sorrow for me so All your diamond tears will rise up and adorn the sky beside me when I go —“When I go,” lyrics by Dave…

Earlier this year during Lent, I visited a Russian Orthodox monastery on an evergreen island out across the water from Seattle. I’d never been there before, but this local pilgrimage felt somehow familiar. After the ferry ride across the chilly waters with seagulls in the air, the drive through the woodsy, misty island on winding…

I found myself engaged in another maddening conversation with my four-year old daughter. We were discussing the aquarium we were going to visit the next day. She wrinkled her nose and pronounced that she wouldn’t go. “Why?” I asked, more than a little impatient. “What if there are sharks? What if there are eels?” I…

When Hulk stops in Africa for a drink of water, he happens to be within Wakanda’s borders, and soon a small fleet of highly advanced aircraft are dropping their payload on him—and trying not to get their wings ripped off. Amidst all the explosions, a scrawny young woman on a motorcycle rides up and sweet-talks…

Lot’s wife, or what’s left of her, stands in the barren wilderness outside Sodom waiting to trip up any who would skip merrily through the Old Testament, seeing God only as creator, provider, and oh-so-merciful father. It’s no wonder that so many poets—with their obnoxious preference for the prophetic—have invited her into their lines to…

The gentlemen I’ve been visiting in my local jail for the past decade live a daily existence, I’ve often considered, not unlike monks in the monastery I’ve also visited. They don’t have their wives or girlfriends with them. They all wear the same plain garment—not black robes, but old red scrubs. Their hair often grows…

I was at work last Thursday when I received the call from the school that every parent dreads: My eight-year-old daughter had been discovered with nits in her hair. Actually, she was not alone. A bunch of children in the class had lice, and the school had pressed administrative staffers into corralling children for impromptu…