Naked
March 29, 2018They’d come from practice at the gym,
their hair steaming,
and in the flirt and banter
would reach inside my girlfriend’s car
DiaBLOGue
Danger on the Right! Danger on the Left! The Ethics of Recent Mormon Fiction
March 29, 2018The first example of what could be called a Mormon short story was written by an apostle, Parley P. Pratt. It was published in the New York Herald on January 1, 1844, and collected in…
The State of Mormon Literature and Criticism
March 29, 2018Two decades have passed since Dialogue last published an issue entirely devoted to Mormon literature. In the meantime literary writing about Latter-day Saints has been burgeoning both in LDS and national markets—so much so that it is difficult for literary critics to keep up with this growing body of novels, plays, poetry, and literary nonfiction. It is very important, however, that they try. To have a sense of the future of Mormon literature, it is vital that we see how present writings articulate with traditions from the past.
Hop Hornbeam
March 29, 2018In the Sacred Grove
near Palmyra, New York,
there’s hardly a tree
old enough to have been
From Under Ground
March 29, 2018From under ground
you can hear them stomp,
a chaotic cacophony
amplified by mud and bone,
Planting Day
March 29, 2018Behind the weathered barn, I crouch
among burlap bags full of this year’s
seed. These kernels promise before
they prove, and I have no choice
Wayward Saints: The Conflict of Opposing Visions | Ronald W. Walker, Wayward Saints: The Godbeites and Brigham Young
March 29, 2018Roanld W. Walker’s study Wayward Saints: The Godbeites and Brigham Young is a valuable contribution to recent Mormon scholarship. Among other things, the book illuminates important questions and concerns of both past and present. Walker…
CAUTION: Men in Trees | Darrell Spencer, CAUTION: Men in Trees
March 29, 2018CAUTION: Men in Trees. Hmmm, one might say. Are these men swaying from limb to limb like the perennial hero, Tarzan? Are these men going out on a limb or barking up the wrong tree?…
from Falling Toward Heaven
March 29, 2018The next morning Allison dropped Howard at the Mormon church in Rockwood, which, except for the thin spire, was shaped like a large, sub urban house. Though he had asked, she refused to go inside…
Trajectory at the End of Winter
March 29, 2018Back from a walk along the Big Wood River in early May
I am the river alive with spring run-off
one moment rushing to be where the calling calls,
the next a pool reflecting or an eddy at play.