Author: James A. Pearson

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

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

Don’t try to give meall of yourself—as if you would, as ifthe wilderness that bears your namewas yours to give. Instead let’s live like mountains: two worlds rooted together but each cutting its own shapeinto the changing sky. I’ll be the one to see you radiant in the morning light, and to watch as evening’s… Continue reading The Space Between Us

Sometimes you need to hidefrom everything you’ve promised to become, so you can find the first promise:the one you and the soft worldsang to each other down beneath the tall bushesalong the old stream bed,back when nobody knew exactly where you were,before the personeveryone needed you to belearned to find you even there. That place… Continue reading The First Promise

Looking up through the windshield atdark wings and a white headcrossing high above I-5. “Just a seagull,” I hear myself say—permission tolose interest, permission to shut downthe aqueducts of wonder. How quickly I abandon my enchantment like it’sa grenade about to bloom or a great eyeopening. Because really I know that the shape of those… Continue reading Permission to Lose Interest