Photo: Simon Maage/Unsplash
February has always been seen as a month for romance, but there are other types of love that can (and should) be celebrated, aren’t there!
My theme/topic for this month is RELATIONSHIPS, and I wanted to share some lovely poetry by my friend Jolene Nolte. We met in Regent College in the fall of 2017, and having had the privilege to hear and read her poetry, I was super keen to share her beautiful words on this blog too. One of my favourite poems by her, The Single Life, was recently published on Fathom Mag.
The poems she’s kindly agreed to share are non-romantic and focus on familial love and friendships. I love their soft cadence and how they gently lead me to think more deeply about the relationships I treasure in my own life. I hope you enjoy them!
xx,
iz
Friend,
By Jolene Nolte
How many times have you gathered
loose threads of my fraying thoughts
and handed them back to me, threaded and sewn?
Faithful are your wounds,
small incisions to remove infections
that would have settled there years ago if not for you.
Your mind contracts with pine needle’s precision,
expands to forest’s breadth.
We meet where time suspends itself over a cup of tea.
To my unborn niece
By Jolene Nolte
I knew a life without you. Suddenly,
you’re here
and not here as you grow,
fragile and unseen.
Your hair will grow, your heart find its pace,
and soon you’ll be walking,
borne along in the great current of time.
What awaits you I cannot say,
only that the Love that carves your shape in darkness,
breathing into your new-formed lungs
will suffuse and sustain you
just as he does now.
jolene
Jolene currently lives in the loudest house on the quietest street in Vancouver, British Columbia. There, she revels in the innumerable shades of green and the fact that she does not have to choose between mountains and the ocean. She is studying theology and poetry at Regent College.
learning to trust in His faithfulness