Author Archives: Matthew Pullar

The first day of spring

began with honeysuckle and clover, the constants of the winter yet rendered more redolent by the scents of September and a bee buzzing about a flowering cactus and ended with a downpour that sent me rushing to the clothesline while my son stood in his raincoat and listened to the rain with all things –Continue reading “The first day of spring”

Noah’s Ark: For Eli

I. Delighted by animals, God and rain, my son finds kinship in Noah’s ark, commentating the story as I leaf through his Bible: “Rain! Giraffe. Boat. Noah. Wet. Monkeys!” How to convey what a rainbow’s about, or how I long for him and his brothers to be kept safe in the ark as the floodContinue reading “Noah’s Ark: For Eli”

Testimony of Earth

For this demon who harms men and corrupts them is particularly anxious that his servants not gaze up to heaven but instead that they be bent over to the earth and make bricks inside themselves from clay. (Gregory of Nyssa, The Life of Moses) At the moment of exhaling, he sanctified the clay he shapedContinue reading “Testimony of Earth”

Sabbath

This afternoon, though I’d planneda much-needed rest, many tasks overtook andsomewhere amidst assembling IKEA furniture I foundthe afternoon gone and dusk charcoaling the sky,so instead I walkedmy toddler to the compost heap and therewe shredded paper scraps to balance the mixand pulled weeds from the side garden whilemy son trialled his latest words and declaredContinue reading “Sabbath”

“The Swelling Year” is here…

Well, after seven years of writing and an intense few months of preparation, my book The Swelling Year: Poems for Holy and Ordinary Days is finally available for purchase. I was very excited this week to discover that, as well as being available directly from lulu.com, it can also be ordered at Amazon, Barnes andContinue reading ““The Swelling Year” is here…”

Campaign Launch – The Swelling Year…

I’m very excited to announce that my crowdfunding campaign to publish The Swelling Year is ready to go. It is live now at Pozible.com, and will be there for the next 31 days for you to donate to. Check out the campaign page to find out about project details and rewards. We’re already underway with contributions,Continue reading “Campaign Launch – The Swelling Year…”

Little Flowers

“Not too many poets has it been given…to live one of their own poems.”(G.K. Chesterton, St Francis of Assisi) If I would be Francis, troubadour to God,before I can sing Creation’s canticles, I must tendto the sleeping children in my roomand die again, again to the selfthat craves to be higher than them.Only then canContinue reading “Little Flowers”

Unexpected Grace: Ten conversion novels you should read

Sadly, literature that brings faith authentically to bear on the world is a rare thing. But here are ten novels that use the narrative of conversion to show faith and grace colliding with the ordinary, the sordid and the plain broken. Not all are by professing believers. Not all are orthodox. But all are compellingContinue reading “Unexpected Grace: Ten conversion novels you should read”