Todd Edward Anderson

A Christian story-teller, poet, and thinker writing from Ottawa, Ontario.

Category: Poetry

  • As The Soldiers Beat Upon My Lord Mercilessly

    As The Soldiers Beat Upon My Lord Mercilessly

    Upon the broad and steadfast plain 
    A quarrel gripped the gathered winds, 
    Who boasted only they could beat 
    And break the proud and silent ground. 

    So, each contrived to make it howl 
    And tore the land with awful whips, 
    Scattering fearful sheep and goats, 
    Savaging leaf and stalk and grain.

    Blow followed blow, terse as the rain
    That aimless strikes both head and heel.
    At last, the trembling ground gave way
    And groaned a long and loud complaint.

    “Who struck you, land, and stirred your voice?”
    The plain gave no reply, so they
    With mockery sewed briar seeds
    In hope the ground would harvest pain.

    Todd Anderson (Stuff of the Rind, Sand and Sail, The Reluctant Prophet) writes the newsletter Mirth to share a behind-the-scenes look at his writing process as well as to offer readers the first fruits of his poetry and reflections. He grew up in the forests of small-town Ontario, contending against nature in all its beauty and harshness.  His training as a literary scholar of Latin and English literature inflects his love of poignant turns of phrase, but it is the influence of his family and their myriad adventures together that infuses his story-telling and poetry with its substance and power.  Todd lives and writes in Ottawa with his wife and six children. If you are interested in supporting Todd’s work, please follow the links below to donate or buy his books.

  • Golgotha

    Golgotha

    Golgotha, to me, was prime real-estate
    For advertisers.
    The highway, state-of-the-art local stone
    Laid by Romans,
    Was broad, and all found it
    Easy to traverse.
    But they squandered their chance
    And stumbled,
    Adorning the rock with crosses,
    Row on row,
    Where billboards could have been.
    Think of the losses!
    Think of the indignity
    Done to the community
    As we erected stalls and stands
    In the looming shadow
    Of those gasping criminals.
    Tis a bad business.

    Todd Anderson (Stuff of the Rind, Sand and Sail, The Reluctant Prophet) writes the newsletter Mirth to share a behind-the-scenes look at his writing process as well as to offer readers the first fruits of his poetry and reflections. He grew up in the forests of small-town Ontario, contending against nature in all its beauty and harshness.  His training as a literary scholar of Latin and English literature inflects his love of poignant turns of phrase, but it is the influence of his family and their myriad adventures together that infuses his story-telling and poetry with its substance and power.  Todd lives and writes in Ottawa with his wife and six children. If you are interested in supporting Todd’s work, please follow the links below to donate or buy his books.

  • Stay of Execution

    Stay of Execution

    The mother of Barrabas wept 
    When her prodigal returned. 
    “My son, my only son,” she cried, 
    And he, with sidelong look and brow 
    Downcast at her unravelled state, 
    Felt only shame to be called so. 
    Thus Joy and Sorrow, by one door, 
    Received whom all had cast aside, 
    Save him, who being a faithful 
    Son, set free, with chains, the faithless 
    And robbed Death of his victory. 

    Todd Anderson (Stuff of the Rind, Sand and Sail, The Reluctant Prophet) writes the newsletter Mirth to share a behind-the-scenes look at his writing process as well as to offer readers the first fruits of his poetry and reflections. He grew up in the forests of small-town Ontario, contending against nature in all its beauty and harshness.  His training as a literary scholar of Latin and English literature inflects his love of poignant turns of phrase, but it is the influence of his family and their myriad adventures together that infuses his story-telling and poetry with its substance and power.  Todd lives and writes in Ottawa with his wife and six children. If you are interested in supporting Todd’s work, please follow the links below to donate or buy his books.

  • Spring

    Spring

    It is bath time for the city.
    We take to it like a sullen boy
    (Caked in grime, pockets tucked
    And crammed with silt and rocks)
    Who hears the long voice of his mother
    While he delights in his forest
    And dreads the foamy warmth ahead.

    Todd Anderson (Stuff of the Rind, Sand and Sail, The Reluctant Prophet) writes the newsletter Mirth to share a behind-the-scenes look at his writing process as well as to offer readers the first fruits of his poetry and reflections. He grew up in the forests of small-town Ontario, contending against nature in all its beauty and harshness.  His training as a literary scholar of Latin and English literature inflects his love of poignant turns of phrase, but it is the influence of his family and their myriad adventures together that infuses his story-telling and poetry with its substance and power.  Todd lives and writes in Ottawa with his wife and six children. If you are interested in supporting Todd’s work, please follow the links below to donate or buy his books.

  • Melt

    Melt

    Tributaries unannounced emerge from hidden closets of the earth
    While spangled oft-by-child-tangled grasses shiver and wake with stiff smiles
    The well-wrought and in-a-fraught-pile-rotting-compost breathes as it heaves
    In sight of the sun since-sour-but-ripening-wisely to a fair zenith
    A well-earned resurrection for the Son-of-Man making the dull day
    Ever the more shine in a restless-dark-won-at-last though scorched and scathed

    Todd Anderson (Stuff of the Rind, Sand and Sail, The Reluctant Prophet) writes the newsletter Mirth to share a behind-the-scenes look at his writing process as well as to offer readers the first fruits of his poetry and reflections. He grew up in the forests of small-town Ontario, contending against nature in all its beauty and harshness.  His training as a literary scholar of Latin and English literature inflects his love of poignant turns of phrase, but it is the influence of his family and their myriad adventures together that infuses his story-telling and poetry with its substance and power.  Todd lives and writes in Ottawa with his wife and six children. If you are interested in supporting Todd’s work, please follow the links below to donate or buy his books.

  • Rhetoric

    Rhetoric

    I will not now, being plain, nor ever,
    Though fancy or siren’s call rebeckon
    With familial fame and longings old,
    Myself deploy such oratic urgings
    As risk your patience and noble esteem,
    Hard won these many years by clear-eyed Truth,
    Who cleaves my heart more humbly than deserved
    And lodging there, has cleansed all artifice,
    Washed my wayward wit and stirred eloquence
    Unrefined though no less potent to stir
    With upright purpose all discerning hearts.

    Todd Anderson (Stuff of the Rind, Sand and Sail, The Reluctant Prophet) writes the newsletter Mirth to share a behind-the-scenes look at his writing process as well as to offer readers the first fruits of his poetry and reflections. He grew up in the forests of small-town Ontario, contending against nature in all its beauty and harshness.  His training as a literary scholar of Latin and English literature inflects his love of poignant turns of phrase, but it is the influence of his family and their myriad adventures together that infuses his story-telling and poetry with its substance and power.  Todd lives and writes in Ottawa with his wife and six children. If you are interested in supporting Todd’s work, please follow the links below to donate or buy his books.

  • To My Niece on Her Departure to School

    To My Niece on Her Departure to School

    When in the door still glancing back your eye
    You see fresh light demur upon the bed
    And hear the lonely wind knock at the pane
    Think then how small the room you leave behind
    How shrinks the colder passages of time
    But though this room to smaller eyes grows small
    And you cannot return and nestle in
    A wider world and strange must grip your heart
    So larger steps a larger hope can win

    Todd Anderson (Stuff of the Rind, Sand and Sail, The Reluctant Prophet) writes the newsletter Mirth to share a behind-the-scenes look at his writing process as well as to offer readers the first fruits of his poetry and reflections. He grew up in the forests of small-town Ontario, contending against nature in all its beauty and harshness.  His training as a literary scholar of Latin and English literature inflects his love of poignant turns of phrase, but it is the influence of his family and their myriad adventures together that infuses his story-telling and poetry with its substance and power.  Todd lives and writes in Ottawa with his wife and six children. If you are interested in supporting Todd’s work, please follow the links below to donate or buy his books.

  • Feast

    Feast

    What love could render 
    It has done 
    As on a flaming skillet 
    Fat doth run 
    Infusing broth or meat 
    With flavour sweet 
    To serve the tongue

    Todd Anderson (Stuff of the Rind, Sand and Sail, The Reluctant Prophet) writes the newsletter Mirth to share a behind-the-scenes look at his writing process as well as to offer readers the first fruits of his poetry and reflections. He grew up in the forests of small-town Ontario, contending against nature in all its beauty and harshness.  His training as a literary scholar of Latin and English literature inflects his love of poignant turns of phrase, but it is the influence of his family and their myriad adventures together that infuses his story-telling and poetry with its substance and power.  Todd lives and writes in Ottawa with his wife and six children. If you are interested in supporting Todd’s work, please follow the links below to donate or buy his books.

  • I Put Them With My Own

    I Put Them With My Own

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  • Exhausted

    Exhausted

    In Canadian winter

    Gasoline-powered

    Cars

    Wheeze along

    Clogged arteries

    Chain-smoking.

    Todd Anderson (Stuff of the Rind, Sand and Sail, The Reluctant Prophet) writes the newsletter Mirth to share a behind-the-scenes look at his writing process as well as to offer readers the first fruits of his poetry and reflections. He grew up in the forests of small-town Ontario, contending against nature in all its beauty and harshness.  His training as a literary scholar of Latin and English literature inflects his love of poignant turns of phrase, but it is the influence of his family and their myriad adventures together that infuses his story-telling and poetry with its substance and power.  Todd lives and writes in Ottawa with his wife and six children. If you are interested in supporting Todd’s work, please follow the links below to donate or buy his books.