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Steven Peterson

Steven Peterson is a poet and playwright living in Chicago.

Poetry

Actors’ House

John 14:2...
Books

Wreckage and euphoria

Barbara Crooker’s new poetry collection is a journey through loss that reveals the world’s beauty.
Poetry

Book Club Inferno

We’re reading the Inferno once again For book club. We have read it twice before. Though two more books had come from Dante’s pen,...
Poetry

Cat and mouse and me

My cat, who’s kept inside all day, got bored, somehow slipped into my attached garage, cornered and caught a little mouse, and gored  ...
Poetry

Apocalypse is beautiful

Apocalypse is beautiful when seen from far away. Our latest telescope retells a distant disarray:   ...
Poetry

Waiting in line for communion

You stand. You do not shuffle, taking strides whenever gaps before you open up....
Poetry

Foreign studies

Twenty-six jet-lagged college studentsarrive in Freiburg, Germany,starting their semester abroad.On their first day they tour the Altstadtunder a low, cold winter sun....
Poetry

Hipshot & Tom

Sunday morning, 1965. I’m ten, Tom’s eight. Comics are in color in the Sunday Chicago Tribune. Church is starting soon but Tom says he won’t go....
Poetry

The apostle in the boat

No, Matthew’s gospel doesn’t mention mewhen I was in that boat, wrestling that sail.But someone had to do it—I could seethe waves were high, the wind a roaring gale....
Poetry

Church going online

Altar bare. No one’s there. It’s unused. Where the Word once was heard: empty pews. It lies dark and was marked unessential....

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Poetry

Dutch windows

Walking through Hoofddorp in the evening dusk I pass a row of houses, brick and square, each with a large plate-glass window exposing a neat and tidy living room inside....
Poetry

Walking trees

Mark 8:22–26...
Poetry

Elegy for eulogies

Sometimes we were surprised   or not but always we felt bad to hear there’ll be no funeral no kind of memorial service no way...
Poetry

God’s own language

The Hindi service is at nine o’clock, the Gujarati is at ten. I pick the later one so when it’s done I’ll stick around when people have the time to talk....
Poetry

Fearful prayer of a high-rise developer

Luke 16:19–31...
Poetry

The humor of Christ

in tribute to Elton Trueblood’s 1964 book of that title...

More by Steven Peterson ›