After Mary, St. Francis is clearly the most popular and influential of all the disciples of Jesus Christ. He embodies the spiritual poverty, humility, and childlikeness which are absolutely essential for anyone who wants to grow. And it is fitting, too, to examine his life in poetry, since Francis is considered by many to be the father of Italian poetry. In these St. Francis Poems, David Craig gives us what literature should: slices of Henry James’s lived life as they move past sentimentality to get to the hard-edged, visceral realities in the original texts–though they never lose sight of laughter or of simple joy. These poems invite us to celebrate with Lady Poverty around her meager table, which is fitting, since that is the only place we will ever be fed. This project itself revisits the haunts of David Craig’s first book, The Sandaled Foot (1980). But here St. Francis seems to come even more deeply alive–next to shelves of cool, protected water, in the red meadows of praise.