Sonnet for Reading During Lent

Sonnet for Reading During Lent

Jessica Hooten Wilson

Even the bookworms return to the dust.
Their collections sold at half the cost.
The dog ears, the jots in the margins,
I was here. I read this. I loved that page.
We read in search of the path to follow.
As though each word spelled out a stone,
Ascending rungs up to the spinning stars.
We read so our hearts may not be hollow.
The thoughts of others slice through to bone.
We weren’t alone when we read those pages.
The table set, a feast for host and guests.
What once forgotten was no longer lost.
And though our flesh again becomes ashes,
We did not live without our chests.

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Jessica Hooten Wilson
Author & Academic

Jessica Hooten Wilson is the Fletcher Jones Chair of Great Books at Pepperdine University. She is the author of several books, including Why Do the Heathen Rage? and The Scandal of Holiness. A Senior Fellow at The Trinity Forum, she has received awards from the NEH, Fulbright, and the Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture. You can read more of her work at her Substack, The Scandal of Reading: Uncovering Holy Wisdom.

Photography by Natalia S.