HMP St Jude was built in 1887. Victorian brick, high walls, narrow windows and iron gates, built to keep people in and everyone else out. The old idea was simple: keep them in, keep society safe, keep trouble behind the walls. Almost one hundred and forty years later, the walls are still there. But prisons have changed, and so have the people inside them. Daniel is awake at three in the morning. The wing is quieter now, though prison is never really quiet. A door slams. Someo

In this secular age, beneath these seemingly silent heavens, in a world busy with other things, this is my prayer for you. That love will overflow, rising from a spring you did not dig, running somewhere beneath the surface of things, its source hidden in God. A taste of Eden. A glimpse of how things might be if the world were not so broken, if we knew how to live with one another, with the earth, with God. That you will learn to see what cannot be counted, to hear what goes

It is 4.17 in the morning. The northern city is dark. Tom is awake. He has spent the night under the arches down by the railway. Cardboard underneath him, sleeping bag over him, shoes tucked under his head. You learn things when you sleep outside. Keep your shoes close. Keep your phone charged. Don’t leave your bag unattended. A bus goes past. Then another. Tom listens to the city starting without him. He smokes a dimp he picked off the floor the night before. People sometime

III. Truth We live in a disenchanted age. A secular age where meaning is reduced, mystery explained away, and the world becomes what can be measured, priced, consumed. We forsake the living water and drink from broken cisterns. And wounded, reduced humanity forgets what it is. Not image, but animal. Not neighbour, but stranger. Not gift, but product. We stumble east of Eden. Lost. But there remain three sisters, triplets, who serve as guides. The first is Beauty. She wakes us

Three Sisters: A Way Home II. Goodness We live in a disenchanted age. A secular age where meaning is reduced, mystery explained away, and the world becomes what can be measured, priced, consumed. We forsake the living water and drink from broken cisterns. And wounded, reduced humanity forgets what it is. Not image, but animal. Not neighbour, but stranger. Not beloved, but useful. We stumble east of Eden. Lost. But there remain three sisters. Triplets. Who serve as guides. The

We live in a disenchanted age. A secular age where meaning is reduced, mystery explained away, and the world becomes what can be measured, priced, consumed. We forsake the living water and drink from broken cisterns. And wounded, reduced humanity forgets what it is. Not image, but animal. Not creature, but consumer. Not soul, but matter. We stumble east of Eden, exiled from a home we can barely remember. Lost. And yet— three sisters remain. Triplets, born together, walking am

He wasn’t looking for God. Jerusalem was swollen with pilgrims. Bread baking. Lambs crying. Children weaving between strangers. Roman eyes watching everything. Another Passover. Another year under empire. His wife would be waiting. Alexander, already hungry. Rufus, full of questions. The road home already unfolding in his mind. Then— a hand on his shoulder. Not kindness. Authority. You. Carry it. For a heartbeat he thought about refusing. But Roman hands do not ask twice. So

Blackstone: Behind the Tune Nicene Creed Series #13 Blackstone Prison was built when people thought stone could keep sin in its place. The walls still stand, black with rain and soot, but what comes through the gates now is rarely wickedness alone. Trauma. Addiction. Voices no one else can hear. Boys who learnt violence before they learnt to shave. Fathers who never had one of their own. Steve has worked here for twenty-three years. He knows which doors stick in damp weather,

York: Foundation Nicene Creed Series #12 “We believe in the Holy Spirit, who proceeds from the Father and the Son.” —- As a boarder at St Peter’s School, every weekday began in chapel. Boys in blazers murmured Morning Prayer, the Psalms, the Lord’s Prayer, the Apostles’ Creed. David Mercer stood among them, learning where to stand, when to kneel, when to answer. The words came first. Meaning arrived later. Years passed. University followed, then Anne, then Hannah, and two ye

Faslane: Breath “We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life.” —- The taxi is already waiting. Marcus’s rucksack leans against the front door. His mum keeps finding little things to straighten— a collar, a loose thread, a sleeve already smooth. The kettle boils. Neither of them has much to say. Last year He had gone to the cinema to watch Spider-Man: No Way Home. Before the trailers, a Royal Navy advert. Travel. Adventure. Learn a trade. His mates Messed about

Heathrow: Lift “He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and his kingdom will have no end.” — The alarm sounds at quarter past four. David is fifty-three. He has flown for twenty-nine years. His wife, Emma, turns over without waking. Downstairs, the kettle boils. He drinks one coffee before work. Wednesday is recycling day. He rinses yoghurt pots, folds cardboard flat, washes the jam jar before putting it out. Outside, the hybrid starts. The M25 is alread

Liverpool: Which Door Stays Open? Nicene Creed Series #9 “He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father.” —- The Liver Birds keep watch above the city. Samuel is thirty-four. He comes from South Sudan. For now, he lives in the Britannia Hotel. One room. One suitcase. His white nursing shoes wait beneath the bed. Inside his Bible lies a folded certificate. Registered Nurse. Sometimes he unfolds it, looks at his name, then slips it back between the Psalm

County Durham: Will Anything Live Again? Matthew is fifty-two. He lives in Blackstone, a village built on coal. Rows of brick terraces. A welfare hall. A Methodist chapel. If you stand at the edge of the fields, the older folk still point and say, “That’s where the pit was.” You cannot see it now. The winding gear came down years ago. The railway was lifted. The earth has grown over what was once the beating heart of the village. Matthew isn’t sure whether that’s healing or

Content note: This poem explores themes of pregnancy, childbirth, baby loss, homelessness, grief, and death. Hereford: And Was Incarnate Nicene #6 “And was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the Virgin Mary, and was made man.” —— Sarah is fifty six and has worked as a hospital chaplain for longer than she cares to remember. Most mornings begin with the same road through the Herefordshire countryside. Mist hanging above fields, blackbirds lifting from hedgerows, the cathedral tow

Ilkley: What Will Save Us? Nicene #5 For us and for our salvation he came down from heaven… —- Peter is seventy-two. He lives alone in the stone house where he and Anne raised their children. The bookshelves are still full: politics, history, economics - the sort of books he once believed might explain the world. Most mornings begin with tea and Radio 4. Sometimes he sits long after breakfast, watching weather move across the moor. The house is quieter now. Not the quiet of a

Content note: This poem contains references to suicide, addiction and allegations of sexual offending. Glasgow: Whose Am I? Nicene #4 —— Michael is forty-three. He lives on the twelfth floor of a block overlooking the M8. Day and night, the traffic keeps moving: lorries, headlights, blue lights flashing somewhere. The city rarely sleeps, and rain freckles the windows. Sometimes he stands at the kitchen sink long after the kettle has boiled, looking out across Glasgow. Tower b

Manchester: A Longing for More Nicene #3 —— Rachel is thirty-six. Every Thursday morning she pushes a buggy through Manchester towards the church hall. She comes for the toddler group. At least that’s what she says. Her daughter loves it: the train set, the toy kitchen, the biscuits. Rachel likes it too— the tea, the conversation, the warmth. The church hall means a few less hours heating the flat. The food bank runs from the building next door. Most weeks she calls in afterw

Canning Town: Where Do I Belong? Maker of Heaven and Earth —— Jay is thirty. Every morning, on the way to work, he passes the cranes. Glass towers rise above the docks. The billboards promise riverside living. Luxury apartments from £750,000. He laughs every time he sees them. Not because it is funny. Because he still sleeps in the room where he slept as a child. His mum has the room across the landing. His sister, who needs support, has the box room. The waiting list stretch

After Mass, Margaret stays behind. Beyond the church windows, the harbour at Oldhaven lies beneath a low northern sky. A handful of fishing boats rise and fall with the tide. The North Sea stretches beyond, grey as memory. The church settles into silence. She gathers the sacred vessels from the altar and carries them into the sacristy. The chalice bears the faint marks of a hundred hands. She polishes it carefully, the way Mrs Donnelly taught her more than forty years ago. Mr

I write poetry because I believe imagination matters. Not as an escape from reality, but as a way of returning to it. ……. Walter Brueggemann describes the prophetic task as seeking “to nurture, nourish and evoke a consciousness and perception alternative to the consciousness and perception of the dominant culture around us.” That has become something of a compass for me over the years. The older I get, the more I wonder if many of our deepest problems begin in the imagination