“Wild angels are my favorite kind…
They believe in Revelation unfolding,
in the sacred scripture we write
between each other.”
Breaking Into Light
is available.
New book Still is here!
*note that orders placed after 12/17 will be mailed after Christmas, but may be picked up in Reston or Arlington through 12/24
ABOUT THE BOOKS
Breaking Into Light is a collection of poems that imagines our breaking not just into fragmentation but into Light. This time is an apocalyptic backdrop of climate change, racial injustice, and the selling out of lives to the god of Profit.
And too, this time is defined by those who work for the Good, who make beauty real, who stand outside on a summer night and listen. It is created with trees that bud during wars. It is made by those who choose recovery, or repair, or compassion. This book is meant to look at all that devastates, all that breaks, and to proclaim still that the greatest is always the Love.
Intended as a personal devotional and as a professional resource, these blessings are meant to travel. They are written to go with chaplains into rooms where outcomes are uncertain. They are written for pastors at gravesides or pulpits or in offering prayers. They are written for spouses waking up in empty beds after sixty years of marriage. They are written for the person who sits down to pray in a place where she never wanted to be. They are written for those who hear the news and don’t know what to do next. They are written to proclaim that there is more than just present pain and future hope—that there is Spirit ever-with-us. And that there are wild angels whenever we look for them!
Still….
It is a word with multiple meanings.
Still, as in not moving, as in being quiet. Motionless.
Or still, as in “up to and including the present moment.”
This book is meant to suggest both.
In a world that is not quiet, that is not motionless, can we find an anchor inside of ourselves that can be the Still Point?
In a world that asks us to consume more, scroll more, want more, can we find an inhale and an exhale to give us stillness?
In a world full of angry people who yell, can we find a place of deep silence, the still place where we can really listen?
This book is meant to offer some anchors for this moment. It is meant to offer an alternative to more hurry and more noise.
And it is meant to proclaim that even now, the promises of Love are still true.
That all is not given up to despair, though cruelty has its fans.
That the Goodness can never be sold to the highest bidder.
That even if the ways we have known become impassable, the Way still exists for us.
That still, our choices matter.
That still, the ways we feed birds in the winter, or serve dinner to someone hungry, or work for what we believe in, matter.
ABOUT LAURA
Rev. Laura Martin drinks too much coffee, cries at stories about dogs, chose to be married in May (because it’s peony season), and finds sabbath hiking on trails and running. She serves as Associate Pastor at Rock Spring UCC in Arlington, Virginia. Prior to ordination, Laura worked with families and individuals experiencing homelessness at New Hope Housing and Shelter House. She is a graduate of the University of Virginia, with distinction, and Wesley Theological Seminary.
She and her husband, Charlie Skopec, are parents to a miniature Goldendoodle named Finn who loves cheese and once won a “highest jump” contest. She serves on the Boards of the Northern Virginia Affordable Housing Alliance and the steering committee of Interfaith Power and Light, and is deeply engaged in the work of the Congregation Action Network on immigration.
TESTIMONIAL
"Count your life" is the name of only one of Laura Martin's poems, but it is what "Breaking into Light" calls us all to do. It sent me through personal memories of "hipbones and hands held..." into hope for resilience in a present that contains Uvalde and war in Ukraine. There is guidance in being tender with those who need my care – a wonderful example is, "What it looks like when I pray for you." Mostly it shows a way forward like the challenge in "First Leaf," that shakes my complacency and reminds me I still have time to live.
-Rev. Maren Tirabassi
POETRY
I gratitude for the flare of sun at my feet,
and the way the trees keep reminding me
that the Way both ever changes,
and is always the same.
I gratitude for the company of saints
long dancing in the garden of Mystery,
and the way I stood near them
in rooms I didn’t know then were sacred…
-Excerpt from “Gratitude”