James A. Pearson, Author at James A. Pearson

Surrounded

A couple weeks ago, as the full weight of this crisis started to settle on me, I organized a meeting of a small contemplative group I’m part of. But with only an hour left before the meeting I couldn’t figure out how to open it. What words or images could possibly meet people where they’re… Continue reading Surrounded

Meanwhile

My body’s been holding a lot of anxiety lately. I search for information, get anxious, so search for more information, and the cycle continues. Last Thursday I took a break and went to a local park that has a few hundred acres of old growth forest. This poem came out of that short trip. I… Continue reading Meanwhile

Nobody Knew

I wrote this little poem last year as spring announced itself in the Northwest. One of the joys of poetry is looking back and seeing how your intuition captured something that you wouldn’t have been able to articulate directly.â£â£â£â£ One thing this poem captured is the dance between two parts of life. â£â£â£â£ There’s the… Continue reading Nobody Knew

The Day Mary Oliver Died

Mary Oliver died one year ago today. I think Wild Geese might have been the first poem that spoke to my adult self. Not that my adult self knew what to do with it. But it called from just over a far horizon that was barely coming into view. It gave me something to muddle… Continue reading The Day Mary Oliver Died

This simple, 5-minute practice changed my life.

On a Friday evening last March I was sitting next to a stranger at dinner. We’d just started a weekend poetry retreat so we pretty quickly got to talking about our own writing practices. That’s when I heard myself say something that changed the rest of my year: Musicians don’t play only their own music.… Continue reading This simple, 5-minute practice changed my life.

Wintering

Now the leaves have fallen.The trees have pulled their alivenessback in from their branches,down into their fortress trunksand the dark, subterranean closenessof their roots. Every year they let go ofexactly what everyone saysis most beautiful about themto save their own lives. The time will come when you, too, have to drop all the ways you’ve… Continue reading Wintering

Let the Wind

Imagineif all you had to doto be beautiful was to let the wind dance you where you stand as you grow into the only shapeyou ever had. Here’s the little tree that helped inspire this poem: This little poem is about a shivering little tree near the top of a mountain. But it’s also about… Continue reading Let the Wind

A poem about life’s fearsome autumns (and surviving them)

When I first wrote this poem I thought it would be the beginning of a longer piece, something with more of a redemptive arc. I tried and tried to find the rest of the poem, but nothing else fit. Reading it now, I love that it stops where it does. That it doesnâ€™t try to… Continue reading A poem about life’s fearsome autumns (and surviving them)

Look to the Sky

I wrote this poem about a month ago while watching the sky one evening. It was based mostly on an intuition and a gathering sadness about all we’re losing in the world. I wasn’t sure if or how I was going to share it. But then today the New York Times published this article: Birds… Continue reading Look to the Sky

Vows to the Mystery

When Elizabeth and I were planning our wedding ceremony we wanted to acknowledge the uncertainty we were stepping into—the unknowable decades ahead, the mysterious ways we’d both change, the inevitable seasons of exile and loss right alongside those of connection and joy. So we decided to say a second set of vows. We called them… Continue reading Vows to the Mystery