Uttering the Holy [Paperback]

Poetry. In this, his second collection of poetry, Adam Hughes continues to weave a tapestry of language. In these poems are found words that illuminate, words that cheer and fulfill, words that inspire longing, words that commemorate, and words that revel in the glory of uncertainty. In his pursuit of the holy, Hughes utters words both profound and common, romantic and rational, hopeful and hopeless. Through it all the voice of the Other whispers and all of creation sings through children, grasshoppers, men on fire, escaped hijackers, and a host of other voices all uttering the holy.

Adam Hughes's poems take place in a world on fire where the shadows creep east and mercy is found in a lion's mouth. These poems listen attentively to the world, to a child's breath in a baby monitor, to the wind, to God's slow exhale. Nothing escapes Hughes's gaze. He populates his work with remoras, moths, flying foxes, five-legged grasshoppers, and wasps dying on garage floors. There's never enough time to decipher 'the unwritten words on the wall,' but these poems keep singing to a God that gave us all the grace He could spare. —Traci Brimhall