Ann Ahrens 🇺🇦
@aahrens430.bsky.social
Chaplain, PhD Christian Worship
Author: Suffering, Soul Care & Community: The Place of Lament in Corporate Worship. (Wipf & Stock, 2023), musician, teacher.
I enjoy nature, birds, music, poetry.
Author: Suffering, Soul Care & Community: The Place of Lament in Corporate Worship. (Wipf & Stock, 2023), musician, teacher.
I enjoy nature, birds, music, poetry.
“When it’s over, I want to say: all my life I was a bride married to amazement.”
Mary Oliver
Mary Oliver
November 17, 2025 at 3:11 PM
“When it’s over, I want to say: all my life I was a bride married to amazement.”
Mary Oliver
Mary Oliver
How anyone can say this and sleep at night is beyond me:
November 16, 2025 at 1:34 AM
How anyone can say this and sleep at night is beyond me:
“Every year we have been witness to it:
how the world descends
into a rich mash, in order that
it may resume.”
-Mary Oliver
(This magnificent Sugar Maple near where I live never fails to dazzle in the Fall.)
how the world descends
into a rich mash, in order that
it may resume.”
-Mary Oliver
(This magnificent Sugar Maple near where I live never fails to dazzle in the Fall.)
November 11, 2025 at 12:31 PM
“Every year we have been witness to it:
how the world descends
into a rich mash, in order that
it may resume.”
-Mary Oliver
(This magnificent Sugar Maple near where I live never fails to dazzle in the Fall.)
how the world descends
into a rich mash, in order that
it may resume.”
-Mary Oliver
(This magnificent Sugar Maple near where I live never fails to dazzle in the Fall.)
Instance #5,462 where the normal folk prop up the rich folk.
October 22, 2025 at 12:06 PM
Instance #5,462 where the normal folk prop up the rich folk.
These excerpts near the end. (It's really worth it to scroll to page 150-ish and read to the end.)
September 30, 2025 at 5:59 PM
These excerpts near the end. (It's really worth it to scroll to page 150-ish and read to the end.)
“If what a tree or bush does is lost on you, you are surely lost. Stand still. The forest knows where you are. You must let it find you.”
-from David Wagoner’s “Lost”
-from David Wagoner’s “Lost”
September 29, 2025 at 12:32 PM
“If what a tree or bush does is lost on you, you are surely lost. Stand still. The forest knows where you are. You must let it find you.”
-from David Wagoner’s “Lost”
-from David Wagoner’s “Lost”
“And have you been trudging like that, sometimes almost forgetting how wondrous the world is and how miraculously kind some people can be?”
-Mary Oliver
-Mary Oliver
August 28, 2025 at 11:55 AM
“And have you been trudging like that, sometimes almost forgetting how wondrous the world is and how miraculously kind some people can be?”
-Mary Oliver
-Mary Oliver
98° by the lake. The swifts are circling, dipping near the water for a sip or an insect. Beautiful.
July 29, 2025 at 9:50 PM
98° by the lake. The swifts are circling, dipping near the water for a sip or an insect. Beautiful.
It’s 98 miserable degrees, with dew points equal to the Amazon (literally). It feels like 110°.
And yet the lake is resplendent with dragonflies flitting about.
And yet the lake is resplendent with dragonflies flitting about.
July 29, 2025 at 9:39 PM
It’s 98 miserable degrees, with dew points equal to the Amazon (literally). It feels like 110°.
And yet the lake is resplendent with dragonflies flitting about.
And yet the lake is resplendent with dragonflies flitting about.
“There is the heaven we enter
through institutional grace
and there are the yellow finches bathing and singing
In the lowly puddle.”
-Mary Oliver
through institutional grace
and there are the yellow finches bathing and singing
In the lowly puddle.”
-Mary Oliver
July 29, 2025 at 12:04 PM
“There is the heaven we enter
through institutional grace
and there are the yellow finches bathing and singing
In the lowly puddle.”
-Mary Oliver
through institutional grace
and there are the yellow finches bathing and singing
In the lowly puddle.”
-Mary Oliver
“Come with me to visit the sunflowers…..
Their bright faces,
which follow the sun,
will listen….”
-from “The Sunflowers” by Mary Oliver
Their bright faces,
which follow the sun,
will listen….”
-from “The Sunflowers” by Mary Oliver
July 24, 2025 at 4:23 PM
“Come with me to visit the sunflowers…..
Their bright faces,
which follow the sun,
will listen….”
-from “The Sunflowers” by Mary Oliver
Their bright faces,
which follow the sun,
will listen….”
-from “The Sunflowers” by Mary Oliver
60 days until the Autumnal Equinox. #RollOnFall #TooHot
July 24, 2025 at 2:04 PM
60 days until the Autumnal Equinox. #RollOnFall #TooHot
By James A. Pearson
July 22, 2025 at 11:52 AM
By James A. Pearson
“Listening to and receiving people is wholesome. Yet we think that our listening needs to produce a result. But the listening is the result.”
-Fr. Greg Boyle
-Fr. Greg Boyle
July 17, 2025 at 11:36 AM
“Listening to and receiving people is wholesome. Yet we think that our listening needs to produce a result. But the listening is the result.”
-Fr. Greg Boyle
-Fr. Greg Boyle
Zinnias.
The joy of summer.
The joy of summer.
July 14, 2025 at 12:15 PM
Zinnias.
The joy of summer.
The joy of summer.
It did, James. A much- needed one. I came round the corner to this glad yesterday morning. What a beauty!
July 14, 2025 at 11:12 AM
It did, James. A much- needed one. I came round the corner to this glad yesterday morning. What a beauty!
This is really sad, not to mention incredibly scary.
July 10, 2025 at 11:44 PM
This is really sad, not to mention incredibly scary.
“I know a lot of fancy words.
I tear them from my heart and tongue.
Then I pray.”
-Mary Oliver
I tear them from my heart and tongue.
Then I pray.”
-Mary Oliver
July 3, 2025 at 12:17 PM
“I know a lot of fancy words.
I tear them from my heart and tongue.
Then I pray.”
-Mary Oliver
I tear them from my heart and tongue.
Then I pray.”
-Mary Oliver
“I will try.
I will step from the house to see what I see and hear and I will praise it.
I did not come into this world to be comforted.
I came, like redbird, to sing.”
-Mary Oliver
I will step from the house to see what I see and hear and I will praise it.
I did not come into this world to be comforted.
I came, like redbird, to sing.”
-Mary Oliver
June 18, 2025 at 11:35 AM
“I will try.
I will step from the house to see what I see and hear and I will praise it.
I did not come into this world to be comforted.
I came, like redbird, to sing.”
-Mary Oliver
I will step from the house to see what I see and hear and I will praise it.
I did not come into this world to be comforted.
I came, like redbird, to sing.”
-Mary Oliver
“And I am thinking: maybe just looking and listening is the real work.
Maybe the world, without us,
is the real poem.”
-Mary Oliver, “From the Book of Time”
Maybe the world, without us,
is the real poem.”
-Mary Oliver, “From the Book of Time”
June 16, 2025 at 11:45 AM
“And I am thinking: maybe just looking and listening is the real work.
Maybe the world, without us,
is the real poem.”
-Mary Oliver, “From the Book of Time”
Maybe the world, without us,
is the real poem.”
-Mary Oliver, “From the Book of Time”