You may have noticed my blog has been more active lately, and that is because I’ve decided to write myself back to joy. Someone said that if you have unexpressed poems inside you, it’ll kill you. (Something like that anyway. Perhaps, they didn’t say “kill” you.)

Lately, I am writing about what emerges each day. It might be in the news, or what I’m reading, or what’s happening around me. Two recent poems were inspired by Philip Yancey and his “fall from grace.”

To be honest, I didn’t know who he was until yesterday, and I find it interesting that his main concern in his writing was grace. So, as I said he has “fallen from grace,” it is only with some people. Personally, I’d rather say he has fallen “into grace,” the same grace he searched to discover, and explain, in his books. The kind of grace you deeply appreciate when you need it most.

Grace is a subject I, too, am deeply interested in and seek to explore in my poems, mostly through the natural world. I downloaded his book, What’s So Amazing About Grace?, and have begun reading it. (The universe works in mysterious ways.) I’m not sure I ever would have cared about what he had to say had he not “fallen.” He said he’s retiring from writing and I thought, What a shame! This is exactly when he should be.

Back to my own poetry.

Lately, as I approach each poem, I have one goal, and it’s simple: write better than AI. And by that, I mean more human than AI can ever be. I’ll never rhyme as well as it can, but it will never live like I can. When the poem begins to emerge, I ask myself why I care. What about that subject relates to my messy human story?

AI has its own story, and if it wants to write about its struggles, I would be curious to read them. But if it writes about human concerns, not so much.

This poetry blog came to be in 2013, and I will continue to tell my stories for as long as I can, to anyone who wants to listen.

Happy 2026, and best wishes to all of you writing stories, songs, and poems!

Linda