Christian Poetry in America Since 1940: An Anthology ed. by Micah Mattix and Sally Thomas (review)

Reviewed by: Christian Poetry in America Since 1940: An Anthology ed. by Micah Mattix and Sally Thomas Yifan Zhang Christian Poetry in America Since 1940: An Anthology. Edited by Micah Mattix and Sally Thomas. Brewster, MA: Paraclete Press, 2022. ISBN 978-1-64060-812-2. Pp. 201. 25. Great artists, as Rowan Williams suggests in Being Human, help us "see things as they really are. . . the dimensions and depths in the world that we might not otherwise spot. " Such hidden dimensions of reality are illuminated End Page 156 in Christian Poetry in America Since 1940: An Anthology, in which Micah Mattix, poetry editor at First Things, and Sally Thomas, associate poetry editor for the New York Sun, collect the works of thirty-five Christian poets that "treat matters of Christian doctrine and practice directly" rather than implicitly (21). The collection features poets of a wide range of faith traditions and artistic schools, from veterans of the new formalist movement, such as Robert B. Shaw and Dana Gioia, to newer voices, such as Shane McCrae and Ryan Wilson. Taken as a whole, this anthology offers an excellent representation of the wide thematic interests and technical virtuosity present in contemporary American Christian poetry. Taking C. S. Lewis's essay "Christianity and Literature" as a point of departure, Mattix and Thomas highlight the function of Christian art as mimetic of, in Lewis's words, "something universally profitable" that transcends mere self-expression. As Mattix states in the introduction, "A work of art in the Christian view is inherently double—both surface and depth, material and immaterial. It is both itself, functioning according to its own rules, and a reflection, or gesture towards, something else" (16). The poems in the anthology reflect this understanding of the mimetic function of Christian poetry both in subject matter and in their attention to form, particularly in response to poststructuralist, anti-symbolic trends in contemporary American poetry. The poets are organized chronologically by year of birth, starting from 1940. Each poet's work is accompanied by a significant biographical introduction. The volume opens with Paul Mariani's "Quid Pro Quo, " which traces the unlikely movement of grace through a father's grief and jubilation. After his wife's second miscarriage, the bereft young father "surprised not only him self but his colleague": by raising my middle finger up to heaven, quidpro quo, the hardly grand defiant gesture a varianton Vanni Fucci's figs, shocking not only my friendbut in truth the gesture's perpetrator too. I was 24, and, in spite of having pored over the Confessions& that Catholic Tractate called the Summa, was sureI'd seen enough of God's erstwhile ways toward man. (25) The poem does not shy away from the candid rage one feels when confronted with what seems to be a senseless human tragedy. The father's anger erupts in an obscene gesture toward God despite years of theological learning, which registers the surprising affinity between the faithful and the doomed in moments of despair. Nevertheless, he receives a son after this hopeless season: this gift, whom I still look upon with joy & awe. Worst, best, just last year, this same son, grownto manhood now, knelt before a marble altar to voweverything he had to the same God I had had my ownerstwhile dealings with. How does one bargain End Page 157 with a God like this, who, quid pro quo, upsthe ante each time He answers one sign with another? (25) "Erstwhile dealings" with God continue to be answered with extravagant grace. The speaker's personal history thus coincides with the timeless story of salvation, as the son takes on the priestly order and thus sacramentally becomes the embodiment of Christ to the Church. As the editors perceptively observes, "In the trajectory of this poem, concerned as it is with the thing of this world—one man's grief, anger, and marveling—the whole mysterious sweep of salvation history is encompassed" (23). While Mariani's poem illuminates the invisible thread connecting fallen, fragmented human experiences, Robert B. Shaw's "Ash Wednesday, Late Afternoon" depicts the vibrant dance of light and dust filling the seemingly. . .