Touch the Earth: Poems on the Way
Gather it from memory.
Let it touch the earth.
In Touch the Earth, Drew Jackson continues the project he began in God Speaks Through Wombs, reflecting on the Gospel of Luke through poetry. Touch the Earth picks up in chapter nine and continues through the end of Luke's Gospel. Part protest poetry, part biblical commentary, Jackson presents the gospel story in all its liberative power. Here the gospel is the "fresh words / that speak of / things impossible."
From the feeding of the multitude ("The best hosts always provide / take home containers") to the resurrection of Jesus ("the belly of mother Earth / is, indeed, a womb . . . the humus of life is where we become fully human"), this collection helps us hear the hum of deliverance--against all hope--that's been in the gospel all along.
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"Touch the Earth is an interdisciplinary work full of Blackness, divinity, grief, community, and many other elements of life that make us human, specific yet universal. It's not a text that one can digest quickly. Each word has to seep into the grooves of the body."
--Morgan Jerkins, senior editor of ZORA magazine and author of This Will Be My Undoing"I'm one of those people who likes the idea of reading poetry more than actually reading it. Occasionally, however, I stumble on a poet like Drew Jackson, whose lyrical language and urgent themes set a hook in me. Drawing on the liberating Jesus of Luke's Gospel, Jackson explores heritage, history, and a longing for freedom. Touch the Earth pushes back against the spirit of scarcity and invites readers into an achingly authentic spirituality. Whether you are a 'poetry person' or not, this book will leave you mesmerized."
--Jonathan Merritt, contributing writer for The Atlantic and author of Learning to Speak God from Scratch
