Why did you write the book?

I never wrote a book! I just wrote things that seemed important to me at the time. I knew early on that the writing touched a very deep part of me. It expressed my own truth. And I think I wrote as a way to remember and define particular moments. It was a way to capture and explore my experience. I wrote to express my feelings, which in my training were rarely validated, and always suspect. Then, after I retired I had time to look the poems over and I saw the growth patterns - out of my head, into the feeling level, out of certainty to ambiguity, out of neediness into gratitude. That's when I saw that I had a book.

What do you think of feelings now?

What I have learned with time is that, at least for me, feelings don't lie. Feelings can be trusted: they aren't always comfortable but they are trustable. Feelings are the language of the spirit. When I look inside, when I listen to myself, I learn where the soul work is at any given moment.

What do you mean by soul work?

I think we are created to love. But we do that very poorly most of the time. Soul work is about learning to love more; more freely, cleanly, effectively, without demanding any particular result. Soul work is about becoming more aware of spirit in my life, and trying to let my own spirit be seen.

So how did the poems get to be a book?

When I shared the poems with friends, they were well received. But I had no success at all when I tried to publish individual poems in journals. I think now that is because individually each poem is not so important. When I came to see the patterns of growth in my life it seemed natural to arrange the poems into a book. Then it seemed important to say that to me, life makes sense! I see that as a very hopeful thing. Because, as I was going through difficult things, with answers I had been given, life seemed very arbitrary and didn't make sense. Things I trusted let me down. But hard times just cracked me open so I could learn. Struggling taught me a lot. I came to trust myself and my connection to divinity. That has never let me down. And I think that's an important message in an age where people are so harried and so hurried, and so driven by an insane culture.

You describe yourself as ordinary. What do you mean by that?

I mean I'm not beautiful, not rich, not famous in a culture which values these things. The culture teaches that it is bad to get old. I value the things I have learned the hard way. I remember how painful it was to be young. I didn't fall off a cliff when I reached forty. I think the aging process is supposed to lead us from cultural imperatives to inner truths. We are made to be led from striving to achieve in a particular way, to acceptance of who we are. That seems to be the gift of aging. And I certainly think many ordinary people experience this phenomenon.

How would people find the book helpful in their own journeys?

I hope it would encourage them to examine and explore their own experience and beliefs. One tiny poem that didn't make the cut for the book:

How dare I
try on ideas
like hats

and yet
how dare I
not?

If we only live within the culture we are missing the boat. We don't have to allow ourselves to be blitzed by advertising and paparazzi. We all need quiet time to come to know ourselves. We need to do more than just react to the world. We need to act from our own truth to heal the culture and the world. Maybe the book is just my little bandage for the world.

Do you have a favorite poem?

I have lots of favorites! But the poem that makes me most happy that it came to paper is Creed. I grew up with several creeds which I believed wholeheartedly long before I could understand their meaning. A few times over the years, when bad things happened, I had tried to figure out what I could really trust in this life. That's how I came to write this one. But I think this creed is my last one. It says it all. So far!

What is another favorite?

We the Dreamers makes me happy because it gives dignity to lesser creatures. I read a book recently by Priscilla Cogan. In it an indian prays declaring himself just a silly two-legged. I like that. Human beings get so very full of themselves!

Is there an important poem?

Yes, I think so. A Question of Perspective is what I really think of nursing homes after working in many over the years. I recall a few years ago when there was a call to open orphanages again. Immediately this cry of NO! arose from the people. Well nursing homes are just orphanages for old people. The poem Couple Found Dead is one I love to read out loud. It gets my blood boiling!
Please understand. I know many good people who give themselves to making nursing homes good places. They work hard and the good ones live with the pain they see. But there isn't any way to diminish the losses the elderly endure when they must live under someone else's authority and apart from their own schedules, without privacy or choice or dignity.

If you could get just one idea out to the world, what would that be?

I think the idea that a human being is just God's energy burning like a candle in this world. At the center of each of us is divinity. All we need to know, we contain already. We just have to find it. That's what The Last Best Holy Card is about.