As a child on a cold Christmas Eve in a country farmhouse in the early 1950s, R. Olin Jackson sat mesmerized before a crackling warm fire in the hearth at his family home in the mountains of northwest Georgia, as his father read - in a deep sonorous voice - Clement Clarke Moore's immortal "T'was The Night Before Christmas." Olin, his brother, David, and sisters Patricia and Mary were fascinated and awed by this wonderfully-lyrical work of art, just as children occasionally continue to be even today. The unique verse in Moore's poem introduced Olin to the inspirational world of that art and its poignant influences upon life.

Even though he didn't know it at the time, poetry was to become incremental to Olin's life. Inspired by such masterpieces as Robert Frost's "Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening," the captivating Kipling's "If," John Greenleaf Whittier's "The Barefoot Boy," and the incomparable Longfellow's "The Wreck of the Hesperus," Olin eventually began making lyrical attempts of his own.

On the pages which follow, a handful of those efforts are presented for the reader. In these heart-felt simple works, Olin has presented a picture of, perhaps, the forces at work as one pursues his or her daily life, and further, musings of the manner in which the Almighty demonstrates to each and every one of us what truly is important in this life so fleeting. . . .