What if?

What if

        you jumped off a cliff

                into the ocean

        and you became the ocean?

 

What if

        you dove into a snow bank

                and you became the snow?

 

What if

        you dissolved into the light

                of a sunset

        and you became the sun?

 

What if

        you slid into the fire of the sun

                and you became a star?

 

What if

        you fell in Love once again

        and you became Love?

     A woman writes poetry - in desperate times, in times of ecstasy, in times of reverie.

     She stops in the Art Museum.  A painting catches her attention.  She fumbles in a bag for a piece of paper.  She finds a used newspaper.  The images take shape.  The insight is born.  The words flow.  A new creation emerges.

     Why does a woman write poetry?  Evidently there are things she cannot express any other way.  There is a creativity that forces its way out, that gives release, that makes something new upon the earth.  The poetic act, the act of making something new, is ontological.  It gives being to that which did not exist before.

Copyright © 2001
by Loretta Dornisch Ph. D.
Available at:
Edgewood College Library
UW Madison Library
Madison Public Libraries
ISBN: 0-7951-0258-5

Available from author

     These poems are a collection of such moments.  They capture pain, joy, pleasure, relationships.  Although poetry stands on its own, each reader brings her own experiences to interpret it.  In that way, the poem and its moments, original and renewed, provide a text for reading a woman's life.  In these texts others may also read the universals of their life experience.

 

  Dr. Dornisch often teaches courses such as Introduction to the Literature of the Bible, or Christian Thought Today, along with graduate courses such as Trends in Ministry or Religious Traditions in the Contemporary World.  Loretta especially enjoys working with students in preparing for professional ministry though field experience or internships.  Loretta has published a number of books and articles.  Her latest books include A Woman Reads The Gospel of Luke and Paul and Third World Women Theologians.

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