More than Writers

  Have I mentioned that I’m doing a Creative Writing MA? With a dissertation project of visual poetry about the transformational impact of faith, hope and love on trauma? One of the pieces I’m working on came from reflections on the verse in John: “In my Father’s house are many mansions.” It got me thinking about heaven. I’ve asked other people what they think heaven will be like, reread my brother’s and father’s sermons, and researched it in theology books. My ideas and beliefs have changed over the process. But an image has stayed in my head the whole time – a house – and I’ve built a model from a kit with a symbolic path leading to it containing my poems. While I was popping silhouettes out of the wooden template, fitting and gluing them together, I couldn’t ignore the smell of sawdust permeating our whole house. I started to think how it would be a familiar smell for Jesus, even if he was more used to wood on a much larger scale. And then I wondered what other things ...