To be a Christian Poet
To Be a Christian Poet
D.S. Martin
To be a Christian poet―or a poet who is a Christian, if you prefer―is to be a reconciler of contradictions. It is a vocation of being misunderstood and marginalized, where rewards are difficult to quantify, and even the purpose behind such a life is questioned, by all except a few visionaries―who may in turn be dismissed for celebrating something with little obvious pragmatic value.
Some callings of self-sacrifice are widely acknowledged as noble. I come from a family of missionaries. My mom grew up in China, the daughter of career missionaries; the oldest of four sisters, and the only one who didn’t follow in the “family business.” Such a focussed calling would only be questioned outside Christian circles.
Finding a Future
When I was a kid, I would have loved to look into my future and see myself as anything. What was I good at? School was a wash-out. I wasn’t disciplined, and I was very good at becoming distracted―a daydreamer, who lived in his own head. I enjoyed sports, but wasn’t aggressive or especially skilled; I loved music, but was too impatient to endure practicing; I certainly didn’t fit into the not-good-at-school category of being mechanical. I liked going to church―singing, stories, hanging out with friends―but I was not good at sitting still.
What I did learn early, was that the one place where an uncategorizable kid like me belonged was in the love of Jesus. I didn’t have to deserve it. I didn’t even have to be “well-behaved” in Sunday school―although I did try. I just had to give him my heart. It wasn’t a difficult decision if you recognize what a one-sided exchange that was. And so, I quickly identified myself as a Christian.
Problem. if you are not the star of the classroom or the baseball diamond, it is not a confidence-building thing to see yourself as different from those around you. If you are already a keep-to-yourself person, it drives you further into an internal life. I became a thinker, a dreamer, a considerer of contradictions, but I didn’t yet value my own intellect. I flourished in my own unremarkable way in our church community, becoming quite good at memorizing Bible verses, but I merely saw this as what you did, not as an accomplishment.
In contrast with this, I found delight, and connection with the outside world, through music. My church friends listened to secular music too, but for most it wasn’t the obsession it became for me. To my parents’ generation, this was not an acceptable passion for a good Christian boy, but the popular music of the ‘60s and ‘70s provided a banquet for the hunger of my internal life. Even so, it confirmed―at least in my mind―my place as an outsider even in the church.
The Poet’s Roving Eye
All of this sounds like a recipe for failure. Even well into my years of persistent dedication to the art of poetry, it had not dawned on me what all this meant. One early clue was this quote from the Irish-British novelist Elizabeth Bowen:
"The writer, unlike his non-writing adult friend, has no predisposed outlook; he seldom
observes deliberately. He sees what he did not intend to see; he remembers what does not seem wholly possible. Inattentive learner in the schoolroom of life, he keeps some faculty free to veer and wander. His is the roving eye."
The late great Canadian poet Margaret Avison touched on this too, in her poem “Poetry Is.”
Poetry is always in
unfamiliar territory.At a ballgame when
the hit most matters
and the crowd is half-standing
already hoarse, then poetry's
eye is astray to a
quiet area to find out
who picks up the bat the runner
flung out of his runway...
This was a revelation! They were both speaking about me. I had thought I had chosen poetry, but now I began to realize I had been made to be a poet. Being an auditory learner―which had helped me learn my memory verses―led to my love of music and the music of language. Being an evangelical baptized me in scripture―sitting under pastors who took very seriously every single word in a passage they were preaching from―attuned me to the linguistic precision that poetry requires. Even being an outsider was part of the plan.
All artists are outsiders. They are not those at the centre of attention, but those observing―sometimes watching the athletes and class clowns, sometimes seeing the way wisps of cloud float across the sky. There are, of course, extroverted artists―the dancers, the actors, the orators―but true artists have something of the outsider deep inside.
Barriers to Entry
I’m not saying that if you don’t see yourself in my story that you can’t become a Christian poet. I’m saying that often the things about ourselves that we would call God’s mistakes, or our own shortcomings, are often the very things God uses to lead us to be who he has made us to be.
Even so, there are huge barriers for anyone who has been called by God to be a Christian artist. The whole idea goes against the evangelical grain.
There’s a pragmatic evangelism-is-all-that-matters mindset, despite the teaching of scripture about our primary purpose being giving glory to God.
There’s a value in the broader culture about working hard to earn money―the Protestant work ethic―which would consider art to only be suitable as a hobby.
To write a poem is an incredibly audacious thing to do. Who are you to think that others should pay any attention to your art? Christians are called to humility, not pride.
Ever since the Enlightenment there has been a belief that reason trumps imagination―as though only what is seen is to be believed. Church leaders who lack artistic expertise, are often suspicious of the arts, feeling they need to be in control of all sanctioned content.
The only reason to be a Christian artist is that God has called you to be a Christian artist. To not obey this calling, I believe, leads to a life of disappointment. Let me share a bit of my ongoing story.
A Lifetime of Poetry
This is a story of years―of reading the best poetry I can get my hands on, of writing poems, of submitting poems to journals, of having poems rejected, of revising, of praying, of the kindness of Christian poets who are further along the road than I am, of reading mountains of poetry, of tiny victories, of becoming a teacher and sharing my love of poetry with young students, of group critiques with writing friends, of reviewing music and poetry books, of dreaming and scheming and praying, of questioning myself over and over, of attending conferences, of writing, of revising, of submitting, of further rejection, of further revision, of more successes, of taking chances, of praying, of actually getting a chapbook of my poetry published, of having my first full-length book published, of beginning my blog Kingdom Poets, of beginning to teach poetry at conferences, of being invited to edit my own poetry series with Wipf & Stock Publishers (where I have now edited more than thirty books), of writing, of revising, of still facing the rejection of poems, of finding my place as a Christian poet, of researching, of praying, of reading the best Christian poetry I can find, of publishing poetry anthologies, of having poems appear in journals near and far, of creating ways to be an encourager and facilitator for Christian poets, of becoming Poet-in-Residence at McMaster Divinity College, of developing a writing technique of intense revision, of becoming friends with many of my favorite poets, of opportunities further-a-field to be the visiting poet, of being a dad and a husband and someone who loves to lead a small group with friends from church, of being an introvert who quietly does his own thing barely comprehended by friends, of becoming a grandfather in the midst of this Corona crisis, of being extremely content and thankful for the blessings of my life.
Every Christian artist must decide for herself to what extent her faith will appear in her work. I always told my students, “Poets write about things that matter,” and so for me the decision was obvious. I had to write about spiritual things. Even when I am writing about something distinctly earth-bound, God tends to force his way into my observations.
Winnipeg poet Sarah Klassen says in her poem “Horizon,”
It isn't easy writing a poem
about Jesus. You could write the sun
hung low over olive groves
...But his hard words
his terrible naked mercy
hang like an awkwardness
across a gaunt horizon...
As I undertook my vocation, I hadn’t planned to become such an encourager of other poets. For ten years now I have been profiling poets and their work on my blog Kingdom Poets. I write about today’s best-known Christian poets, about those who are less known, about famous poets and not-so-famous poets of the past―highlighting those who speak profoundly of faith in God. I profile poets from around the world and from various denominational backgrounds. In doing this I magnify the legacy of those who have gone before, encourage today’s readers to investigate their contributions, and celebrate the work of the poets who are writing today. I have also developed venues for Christian poetry to appear, such as my web-journal Poems For Ephesians, which is on the McMaster Divinity College website, and the three anthologies I have produced. This was God’s plan, not mine.
As a poet, I have become a better reader of the Bible―comprehending the poetic veins that run from Genesis through Revelation. I have learned to better read between the lines of scripture, and between the lines of experience, as the Spirit communicates what must be perceived through the Spiritual imagination. I have learned, better than I otherwise would, how to walk with the unseen. To be a Christian poet is for me the best life I could ever dream.
D.S. Martin
Poet & Editor
D.S. Martin is Poet-in-Residence at McMaster Divinity College. Ampersand (2018) is available from Amazon, or Wipf & Stock, as are his other collections and anthologies. Visit his blog Kingdom Poets and Poems For Ephesians.
Photography by Paul Sandoval