Hope in Dark Places

Poems about Depression and the Christian

David Grieve

• Publisher: Sacristy Press
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9781910519677
• eBook ISBN: 9781910519691
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Religious Poetry
• Index: Literature

The deeper darkness,
that smear you only just see out of the corner of your mind's eye as 
you contemplate ending it all,
that not-so-much-no-go area
as a darkness-he's-gone-further-into-than-anyone-else,

is where Christ is.

Hope in Dark Places explores the depths of depression through the poetry of David Grieve. You will be moved to tears and laugh unexpectedly. You will feel the raw reality of suffering and feel Christ's presence in its midst.

Hope in Dark Places

Poems about Depression and the Christian

— David Grieve —

Sacristy Press
PO Box 612, Durham, DH1 9HT

www.sacristy.co.uk

First published in 2017 by Sacristy Press, Durham

Copyright © David Grieve 2017
The moral rights of the author have been asserted

All rights reserved, no part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical photocopying, documentary, film or in any other format without prior written permission of the publisher.

Bible extracts, unless otherwise stated, are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicized Edition, copyright 1989, 1995, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

The extract from Philip Larkin’s poem “Heads in the Women’s Ward” in Collected Poems (1988) is reproduced by kind permission of Faber and Faber Ltd.

Every reasonable effort has been made to trace the copyright holders of material reproduced in this book, but if any have been inadvertently overlooked the publisher would be glad to hear from them.

Sacristy Limited, registered in England & Wales, number 7565667

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for the book is available from the British Library

Kindle: ISBN 978-1-910519-68-4
ePub: ISBN 978-1-910519-69-1

Contents

Foreword

Preface

Anagrams

Candle

Comfort

Confirmation

Every So Often it Must be Spoken Of

Faith in Disorder

February

Feeling Better Again

God of Our Silent Tears

Head Lifter

Hope in Dark Places

How To Be, Depressed.

I Fear, It’s Jesus

Living Free

Marbles

May I Stress?

Moments of Clarity

Not Now But Later

Old Testament Lesson

On Reading Philip Larkin on Death’s Approach in Old Age

One of These Days

Out of Darkness

Reaching Out

So Well, So Much

Saying It Again

The Bush is Still Burning

That Deeper Darkness

Therapy

When I Write I Live

Your Spirit

Epilogue

Resources for further help

To all with mental health illnesses

Foreword

Depression is both an experience that everyone has had—a passing lowering of mood—and also a common mental disorder (or illness). Simply speaking, depression is considered to be an illness when it lasts a long time, or becomes bad enough to interfere with everyday life. One in five people suffer from this kind of depression at some point in their lives. One in five people therefore know first hand what it’s like to be depressed—and the rest of us will all know someone who has been depressed. Yet, depression remains widely misunderstood, not least amongst Christians.

A part of the problem is that we do all know what it’s like to be low in mood. Much as we don’t like such experiences, they usually pass. We therefore think that they should pass for other people too. But, what happens when they don’t? It’s all too easy to be unsympathetic, to imagine that we “know what it’s like” or to offer trite solutions for “looking on the bright side”. The reality is that we usually don’t know what it’s like—especially in the case of the more extreme forms that depression can take—and that simple solutions don’t work. If they did, there wouldn’t be a problem!

A complex conjunction of altered neurochemistry, adverse life events, altered patterns of thinking, and social alienation, the darkness of depression is rarely dispelled by the candles of well meaning words tha...

Table of contents

• Foreword
• Preface
• Anagrams
• Candle
• Comfort
• Confirmation
• Every So Often it Must be Spoken Of
• Faith in Disorder
• February
• Feeling Better Again
• God of Our Silent Tears
• Head Lifter
• Hope in Dark Places
• How To Be, Depressed.
• I Fear, It’s Jesus
• Living Free
• Marbles
• May I Stress?
• Moments of Clarity
• Not Now But Later
• Old Testament Lesson
• On Reading Philip Larkin on Death’s Approach in Old Age
• One of These Days
• Out of Darkness
• Reaching Out
• So Well, So Much
• Saying It Again
• The Bush is Still Burning
• That Deeper Darkness
• Therapy
• When I Write I Live
• Your Spirit
• Epilogue
• Resources for further help