The Church declared St. Christopher more myth than reality, but tradition is so much more enduring than authority — and so he continues to hoist us up, protecting us on our many and varied journeys. For these journeys can be perilous. Anyone who has cared for a loved one through a terminal illness knows that sometimes it is all too much — and so we call upon our saints, and build little altars of memories and glimpses of who we have lost, and who we were as caregivers or parents or friends. Even without the assistance of faith, we learn to bear one another's burdens, our words a way of ensuring — not immortality for those who have died — but a familiarity and communion that endures in the telling.
Michael Bonacci received
his MFA in Creative Writing from Vermont College. Besides
writing poetry, he enjoys adapting historical documents
for the stage and has had several play produced in New York,
Minneapolis, and Seattle. He is a former Anglican priest, and
also lived and studied at a Benedictine monastery and Buddhist
Zendo. After managing several nonprofit organizations in the
Midwest and Seattle, he moved to the Skagit Valley in northern
Washington, and now lives with his partner, David Bricka, near
the Cultus Mountains.
The Former St. Christopher is offset printed in a limited edition of 500 copies, perfect-bound in an attractive letterpress cover, designed and printed by Jules Remedios Faye.
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