Weekend Retreat: Mystical Poetry and Spiritual Verse as a Sacred Practice

This weekend retreat will celebrate the spiritual life in an interfaith context, using sacred poetry from around the world to invite us into prayer and listening for the presence of the Spirit in our lives.

From the ecstatic verse of Rumi or Saint John of the Cross to the sacred lyrics of hymns and canticles poetic language has long been a central means for humanity to try to express the wonders of the Spirit that can never be fully captured in mortal language. The love poetry of The Song of Songs, the inspiring words of the Magnificat, and the devotional honesty of the Psalms are just a few examples of the treasures of spiritual poetry — and those examples are just from a single source: the Bible! Every spiritual and mystical tradition from around the world has its treasure of luminous and uplifting poetry, verse and lyrics. From the Zen Haiku of Basho to the ecstatic love poetry of Mirabai and the sly wisdom of the Tao te Ching, poetry is a universal — and surprisingly accessible — doorway into our common human yearning for the mysteries of the Spirit.

During this weekend retreat, we will feast on poetry from around the world to reflect on these eloquent words of wisdom in the spirit of lectio divina (sacred, meditative reading). We'll seek to allow the poetry of the world’s great mystics to invite us into a space for prayer and contemplation. Our focus will include not only great mystical classics from the past, but also some contemporary mystical poetry from recent and living writers like Mary Oliver, Chelan Harkin and David Whyte. If you have a favorite poem, bring it along to share. But even if you feel like you don’t know the first thing about poetry, join us anyway, for our goal is to explore the spiritual wisdom of lyrical verse in a fun and down-to-earth way.

This is a silent retreat. Guests will be supported in keeping a sacred silence throughout the weekend, including at meals.