An Ekphrasis of Genesis

At the intersection of verse, image, and spiritual study, you'll find Joseph L. Bensinger's An Ekphrasis of Genesis. In this poetic retelling of biblical origins, the shaping of the Judeo-Christian world is by turns cosmic and earthly-both scripture and science. "For order was created / from the collapsing of possibilities / into a formed thought, a singularity," the poet says. What unfurls here between poem and illustration is a lyrical exegesis of the Book of Genesis, those layers pulled back to reveal the spiritual lessons buried deep within these stories of biblical beginnings. In learning about when this world was new, what deeper truths might we also learn about ourselves? With this chapbook of the metaphysical and the mundane, poet Joseph L. Bensinger offers up a profoundly personal reading of the Old Testament and a guide for the fraught heart of humanity that follows long after it.