Dear Readers,
This summer I am taking an independent study on “The Theology of Art and Place.” I am interested in my generation’s nomadic experience of the world and my own homesickness. I want to know how to live in a place well, especially in our present age.
The title of my Substack, “Not Yet Home,” is an allusion to a poem that I wrote in college about Shymkent, the first city I ever lived. I share that poem here as an introduction to the summer and also to extend an invitation for my readers to reflect: What are the places that formed you, that made you what you are today? What do you remember about those places? What did you love about them and how did you experience God’s love in them?
Sincerely,
Michael
Shymkent
I remember you like an overcast morning silver clouds are still beautiful somber as they may seem when I recall our time together I smile, because I know you were there for me I was a child a child of the world as well as a child of my parents but really a child of you you were my first Kazakh friend we walked together down the dusty streets along the gutters where I used to place paper boats there is something holy about a cup of tea shared around the table in a stranger’s home three spoons of sugar (maybe four) may hurt your teeth but the tea is good and it makes your hosts smile to see you ask for more I am a paper boat sailing along a drainage canal I am a nomad a man of not yet Home I wonder where does all the rainwater go?