Theology, Poetry, and Corn

Where am I now and where am I going?

Untitled, 1975. Helen Frankenthaler

On Valentine’s Day, I received a message from Duke Divinity informing me they were “sorry to report” they were “unable” to accept my application this year. I knew the chances of getting in were slim, and my application was a bit of Hail Mary. There was a lot working against me with this application, and I knew that, but I submitted it anyway on the chance that just maybe they would accept me.

That’s the rub.

Is Duke and all that Duke represents to me rejecting me, or simply rejecting my application? And though I know the answer to that question, it doesn’t matter, because I know what it feels like - a look of disdain from an institution that can either let me know that no, I’ve not been lying to myself and the world this whole time, that I actually am intelligent and have something to offer, or no, in fact, I am not smart and why did I bother applying at all?

After I read that email, Katrina and went to an Italian place for Valentine’s day and I had a mediocre plate of spaghetti and a glass of ice water with extra floaties from the dishwasher.

Now that the fleece has been laid bare, and I’ve received an answer, what’s in store for the future?

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I’ve taken a deep dive into poetry lately - reading it, writing it, reading about it, listening to people talk about it, and listening to people read it. I have been writing poetry since I was a child. There are notebooks and receipts and napkins and journals and sheets of paper and notes on phones and who knows what else strewn all over the world with poems I’ve written, but it’s never been something I’ve “pursued,” never something I tried to turn into a thing or a craft I tried to perfect. I just write poems.

Many poets recall a moment or poem that started them on the poetry journey. I have no such memory. I remember reading Shel Silverstein in grade school, and I loved the way he made me feel I could push against the norm, that I could transgress the expectations of adults without being disobedient… or evil. My grade-school moral categories were delineated along the only-right vs. only-wrong binary familiar to so many Evangelical households. The irony was, as a child, I was the one intent on maintaining that binary over against the rest of my family. Shel’s poetry allowed me to see outside my boundaries, even while so young, even though I wouldn’t be really ready to push them until I was in high school. I also read and re-read Romeo and Juliet and many of Poe’s works in junior high.

Last summer, I went on a writing retreat with some friends from Estuaries with the intention of prepping a book proposal about Christian ethics, land, and discipleship. I found myself, though, writing poetry with little interest in working on this book proposal. Writing in my journal, I talked about how poetry allowed me to tell the truth in a different way than my more academic-lite work, more than the didactic work you’ll generally find here on my Substack. I’m only realizing it now, but this is what I loved in Where the Sidewalk Ends and A Light in the Attic by Silverstein.

Another irony: I decided to apply to Duke Divinity while on this retreat.

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A few years ago, Katrina and I went to an exhibit here in Kansas City featuring hundreds of pieces of Mayan craftwork from pottery to architecture, from statuary to illustrated codices. This isn’t surprising, but corn featured heavily in the exhibit. As I meandered through the exhibit, reading about the sacredness of corn to the Mayan people, I felt like I was having a kind of awakening, possibly akin to David Carrasco’s “Aztec moment.” It was a feeling of connection and longing—connection to my ancestral roots in Anáhuac, or ancient Mesoamerica. Those roots are long buried, and my body and soul are a mestizo reality, a hybrid reality, but I feel the pull of that ancient way of being. The people of ancient Mexico and the surrounding areas believed their bodies were made from cornmeal, in a similar way to how Scripture speaks of humans being formed from soil.

I suppose I consider the soil bit from Genesis to be more “factual,” whatever that actually means, but there is a truth to the idea that my ancestors and I come from corn, that our very flesh is made from the treated and crushed grains of elotl (a Nahuatl word for corn). The sacred plant served as the foundation upon which nutrient rich meals could be prepared. When consumed with squash and beans, which were all grown together along with a variety of chiles, it forms a complete protein necessary for holistic nutrition.

This was all happening on the back of another awakening I was experiencing in which I felt a call to see, hear, and pay attention to land (you can read more about that here). I was already thinking about making an attempt at growing food, and after our time with the Mayans, I decided to grow corn, beans, and squash.

It was mostly a disaster. I didn’t prepare the ground well and all the corn died because it didn’t get enough water nor, I think, nitrogen. I ate two squash, though I planted at least six plants, because squash bugs got to most everything. The bean plants were quite successful, but I didn’t plant nearly enough to get enough for even one meal for Katrina and I. But damnit, I learned a lot, and I grew food successfully last year (except for squash because of those bugs!), and I am going to try again this year.

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I turn 40 in less than a month, and I’m holding the three things in my hands - a love for theology with a rejection by Duke, a love to read and write poetry, and a fascination with corn and a desire to cultivate it. I am imagining a convergence where theology, poetry, and agriculture meet to form something more than what any are by themselves. An ecosystem, an estuary, formed by these three worlds creating something new, or at least new for me.

Lord, may it be.

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I’ve had to confront some deep insecurities in light of this rejection. I have long been afraid, always been afraid of performing a creative task poorly. I have never wanted to be bad at anything. What I didn’t know growing up was that almost no one is good, truly good at anything when they first attempt it. A person may be more or less intuitive at an endeavor, it may come more or less naturally to them, but anyone who is great at something has been disciplined about practice and attention. I was naturally drawn to art, music, and writing. My early attempts were quite good for what they were, but I mistakenly believed that if I were truly good, I would draw or paint or play music as good as I wanted to immediately. I believed this until about two years ago.

What I was good at was theology. It was teaching and study and communicating the truths I was learning from Scripture in a way that people could understand. I believed I was good at this because people told me I was, and though there’s nothing wrong with that, what I came to believe was that theology and teaching were where I was “supposed” to be. I have no regrets spending the time and giving the attention to theology and Scripture that I have, as this has formed me into the person I am today, but I gave to theology what I have never given to anything else - time and discipline.

When I read the rejection letter, what immediately came to the surface was self-doubt. If I had written a better statement of purpose, if I had a better writing sample, if I had attended a different seminary, in a word, if I were smarter, Duke would have accepted me. And if I’m not intelligent, what am I?

Stupid.

And being stupid is the thing I do not want to be. I am not an artist. I am not a musician. My poetry is amateur. My writing is okay. But at least I am smart, or so I thought, because this rejection letter was telling me something different.

It’s not true, of course, that the letter means I’m stupid, but the insecurities mount up all the same. The rejection, though, means I will have time to pursue this dream of bringing agriculture, corn, and theology together into something new. It was watching things grow in the first year I planted a garden that taught me about the necessity of time and discipline. It was watching the corn sprout, grow, then die before they could fruit, that taught me the only thing one can do when things don’t go according to plan is attend to the soil and try again when the seasons are right.

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I want to be smart, 
but looking at these books
on this bookshelf reminds me
I'm not as smart as I should be.
At least that's what they seem to say
as I sit and stare
like they're women dancing
for me in Dutch windows. 

I want what they have,
and I love the way they make me feel,
lying open in front of me.
But when I'm done, 
when I've tasted everything 
and spent myself
with consumption,
will I be happy with who I am?

I wrote this poem shortly before applying to Duke while looking at a friend’s bookshelf, thinking about how well the books were curated and how this, too, tripped my insecurities.

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I’m not sure what my point is in writing all this other than to give a kind of update of where I am these days. Though Thoughts and Prayers will continue to be my theological commentary on life and politics, I hope to bring more poetic elements into this Substack. I want my work—whether it’s here, in a garden, academia, or wherever—to be an endeavor of the body and heart, not only the mind. I want to write more poetry this year and in the years to come and I hope to get better at it. I want to grow food, especially corn, and see where that path will take me.

Finally, thanks to all who have followed and read my Thoughts and Prayers for nearly three years now, and special thanks to those who are financially supporting this endeavor. Here’s to more years of writing and growing.