Before the Door of God

Before the Door of God traces the development of devotional English-language poetry from its origins in ancient hymnody to its current twenty-first-century incarnations. The poems in this volume demonstrate not only that devotional poetry—poetry that speaks to the divine—remains in vigorous practice, but also that the tradition reaches back to the very origins of poetry in English. There is a sense in these pages that the tradition of lyric poetry that developed was nearly inevitable, given the inherent concerns of the genre. Featuring the work of poets over a three-thousand-year period, Before the Door of God places the devotional lyric in its cultural, historical, and aesthetic contexts. The volume traces the various influences on this tradition and identifies features that persist in devotional lyric poetry across centuries, cultures, and stylistic differences. To scholars, literary professionals, and general readers who find delight in fine poetry, this anthology offers much to contemplate and discuss.

Jay Hopler is associate professor of English at the University of South Florida. He received the prestigious Yale Series of Younger Poets Award in 2005, as well as several other awards, for his first book of poems, Green Squall. He lives in Tampa, FL. Kimberly Johnson is associate professor of English at Brigham Young University. She is the author of two collections of poetry and a translation of Virgil's Georgics, as well as a number of scholarly works on Renaissance literature. She lives in Salt Lake City, UT.