The chapbook Jesus Said (Orison Books, 2017) is available from the Orison Books website in a limited edition of 250 copies.
In a moving sequence of poems, Patrick Donnelly addresses a Jesus of his own Rilkean imagining—a personal, intimate, fluid manifestation of the divine who seamlessly embodies elements of Eastern and Western religious traditions.
“In lyrics wry and soulful, Donnelly suggests the gay boy can count himself in. Donnelly’s sound and approach I’d thought might never come back again. What excites me about these poems of Donnelly, is how alive Jesus is, how personal and real: Jesus is available as he once was for George Herbert. Poets of the last generation, from O´Hara to Bishop, seemed to do away with Jesus. Donnelly writes: ‘I told Jesus, for thirty years I asked you to send me someone to love, and then Stephen came and we married, but we were old, so I begged you, keep us alive, let us live a little longer.’ I am grateful for such a sweet clean original gospel.”
—Spencer Reece, author of The Clerk’s Tale and The Road to Emmaus
In a moving sequence of poems, Patrick Donnelly addresses a Jesus of his own Rilkean imagining—a personal, intimate, fluid manifestation of the divine who seamlessly embodies elements of Eastern and Western religious traditions.
“In lyrics wry and soulful, Donnelly suggests the gay boy can count himself in. Donnelly’s sound and approach I’d thought might never come back again. What excites me about these poems of Donnelly, is how alive Jesus is, how personal and real: Jesus is available as he once was for George Herbert. Poets of the last generation, from O´Hara to Bishop, seemed to do away with Jesus. Donnelly writes: ‘I told Jesus, for thirty years I asked you to send me someone to love, and then Stephen came and we married, but we were old, so I begged you, keep us alive, let us live a little longer.’ I am grateful for such a sweet clean original gospel.”
—Spencer Reece, author of The Clerk’s Tale and The Road to Emmaus