DiaBLOGue

Thistle Field

So speaks King Saul: 
I want this modest man of war
David, dead. 
Snare him with a string 

The Celestial Kingdom

Julie was asked to be baptized for the dead. Her teacher, Mrs. Dixon, had read down the roll, asking the girls in alphabetical order. She had moved into Julie’s neighborhood, just up the street in…

Defending Jose

Samuel was watching the door intently when they let José in. He stood up, smiled as if he were greeting an old friend. He opened his body toward the inmate and reached out, completing the…

Straight Up

Shirley is the punch line who holds the joke 
while we wait like pieces on a game board 
in the line that wanders 
from the classrooms, through the halls, 

One Man’s Definition of LDS Membership

Some thirty years ago my faith in the Mormon church changed forever. I was twenty-eight years old, a husband, father, school teacher, high priest, and a highly idealistic and credulous young Mormon. Looking back, I…

Miguel

I meet Miguel 
bear hugging him from behind 
tense tendons in his neck 
rage squeezing out his eyes: 

“The Prophet Puzzle” Revisited

In her 1974 essay, “The Prophet Puzzle: Suggestions Leading Toward a More Comprehensive Interpretation of Joseph Smith,” Jan Shipps con fronted the anomalies in the historical record concerning Smith, noting: “What we have in Mormon…

One Method of Hope

The only motion here is an old 
Dodge pickup leading a coil 
of white exhaust across 
the horizon—a snow-dusted