Come My Beloved – Stars Shall Bend Their Voices

Yehoshua November
At the bottom of the steps we formed a circle and danced in front of the ancient Wall whose cracks were crammed with desperate notes—scribbled prayers for healing, for an escape from poverty, for children, for finally finding the fated marriage partner. A classmate with a sweet voice would take his spot in the front of our group and begin to lead the Sabbath evening prayers. Soon, the sky overhead turned deep blue, and we sang the hymn that ushers in the Sabbath, “Come, My Beloved, to Greet the Bride.

Contributors

Margaret Gibson

Kate Daniels

Scott Cairns

Dana Gioia

Maurice Manning

Kwame Dawes

Linda Gregerson

Patricia Jabbeh Wesley

Robert Hass

Mark Jarman

Zeina Hashem Beck

Kathleen Norris

Lorna Goodison

Kimberly Johnson

Kaveh Akbar

Vijay Seshadri

Yehoshua November

Sydney Lea

Jason Gray

Jacqueline Osherow

Richard Chess

Jay Hopler

Shara McCallum

Alicia Ostriker

Edward Hirsch

Praise

Editor Johnson invited an array of poets and essayists to write of their choice hymns. He said of the poets, “They became like a temporary congregation to me.” Among essayists, Kwame Dawes writes a magnificent piece (the song chosen is “Great Is Thy Faithfulness”). Dawes states this is as not only a grounding principle of faith for him, but one shared equally with his wife, Lorna — it is “their hymn.” It’s a privilege to read the various hymns that are life-changing, and because poets feel as they write, it makes tender reading. The hymns’ lyrics are produced in their entirety which gives us the key to each essayist’s experience, and makes the book a dialogue between the speaker and his/her hymn.
-Grace Cavalieri
Washington Independent Review of Books

“I like to sing,’ begins Alicia Ostriker in her essay that joins so many necessary voices of contemporary poetry. Each piece collected in this book allows for memoir, prayer, and rebellion in its examination of what hymns have and can mean to the culture, to the heart. In these pages, the writers you’d think of as most interested in skepticism lay bare their politics and their personal history in order to better know their relationship to faith.”
—Jericho Brown, author of The New Testament

“From Zeina Hashem Beck’s memories of hearing prayers from Tripoli’s mosques to Linda Gregerson’s most beloved Christmas hymn, these essays reveal contemporary poets’ connections to spiritual songs: the lyric impulse, the importance of breath, the pull of anaphora and rhyme. Stars Shall Bend Their Voices is an illuminating—and luminous—collection.”
—Maggie Smith, author of Good Bones

Poets craft words to affect us; hymns sing words into our bodies. How wonderful, then, to read skilled poets speaking personally about hymns and spiritual songs they know. I love this wonderful compendium of poets who have taken hymns to heart—insightful, moving, and revelatory. -Donald Saliers, author of Music and Theology.

Tag: Come My Beloved

Yehoshua November: Come, My Beloved, To Meet the Bride