“It is our good fortune that some books arrive when we need them most. Bearing the Cast, by Skip Renker, is such a book, full of light, tenderness, grace and rich in its observations of the world’s natural beauty, making us feel a part of a larger world far beyond the headlines of war, hate, blame, fear. The quiet realm of Skip Renker’s poetry helps us see afresh the beauty which surrounds us and quickens our faith. Immerse yourself in Renker’s poetry and let your heart be glad again. Hear his self-advice, ‘be still for as long as it takes...stand with open palms in an attitude of listening.’”
Jean Connor – Author
A Cartography of Peace and A Hinge of Joy
“Skip Renker writes us into his tempestuous love affair with leaves and water and humanity, as if mining the underpinnings of the universe. Inklings of the unseen settle in many of his poetic lines. As he probes mysteries, ironies, ordinaries that prove to be extraordinary his moods move up and down the scale from black humor to jubilation, and in language that justifies it—from ‘the plodding ego’ to ‘bright clarity of appetite.’”
Luci Shaw – Author
Sea Glass: New and Selected Poems
Writer in Residence, Regent College
“This collection bears the imprint, the cast, of devotion to our world, what’s seen and unseen. The poems come out of a rich interior life that’s working, as it watches a still surface, not anxious for disturbance even as it acknowledges the inevitable. Our attention moves between the river and its banks, flow and stasis, sometimes luring the poet’s spirit, sometimes getting the best of his shoes. Skip Renker’s literal balance and the good-humored loss of it, memory’s agile revisions, the detaching comforts of aging, make this book one to return to, for in its depths, like a river or an attentive mind, it bends, ‘looping back’ with more to offer as ‘its giver, needing nothing, gives and gives.’”
Jeanine Hathaway – Author
Motherhouse; The Self as Constellation; The Ex-Nun Poems
