Poem Sweet Poem

When it comes to daily prayer and worship, spiritual writer and freelance photographer Katrina Warme (’16) is in constant communication with God—seeking wisdom to make ethical choices, sharing God’s affection and compassion with the world around her, and admiring the natural beauty in all creation.

The author of the recently published book of poetry, hello, dear one...,Warme’s work is a creative collection of her prayers to God and the desired responses she imagines receiving from him. Conscious of her audience’s potential religious diversity, she unveils her private conversations with God through spiritually generic language that resonates with the majority of her readers—even those who are not affiliated with any specific faith.

Warme also shares her poems on Instagram (under the handle @sweeterchord and compiled through #sweeterpoetry) where the deeply emotional words are strategically paired with original portraits to tell stories that invoke optimism and reinforce self-worth.

“I believe that hope is a choice as much as it is a feeling,” she explains. “The more we choose to be thankful and hopeful, the richer our lives will be and the more we will be able to notice what God is doing around us.”

The following poems from hello, dear one... illustrate Warme’s message of remaining faithful during adversity, which she describes as “a sweeter chord in a dissonant world.”

The Definition That Was Never Yours To Write

Note to self:

Every time you said, “it couldn’t possibly get better than this,” it did.

So then why do you keep believing that you don’t matter, when even the most beautiful things in life are drawn to you?

You are not the sun, setting vibrantly and leaving darkness. You are the horizon it longs to dive into, knowing that in you it finds a new beginning.

The Truest Birthday Gift

It’s not that I want to convince you that you are loved. It’s that I want to be your reminder— today and whenever you need it (even if you don’t think you do)—that you already were. Utterly. Completely. Incessantly and perfectly. By the One who called you “Beloved” before time began.

(You need this too, dear one.) Yes. I need other people.

And that’s okay, too.

The Christening

“You are the same,” said the voices, “when everything around you is different. New. Whole. Rejoicing. But you? You are the same. You are stuck.”

No.

I am new every morning, whole again each moment, and I will not believe their lies again.

This is for You.