I would characterize my sabbatical plan as sitting quietly for a season under the Holy Spirit’s “bright wings,” a phrase borrowed from Gerard Manley Hopkins’ God’s Grandeur, signaling my desire to restore and nurture the life-giving practice of writing poetry. Sadly, in recent years I have allowed the demands of pastoral leadership to squeeze out this essential creative outlet which, throughout my life, has been a source of identity, of joy, of inner renewal, and a way of disciplining my soul to look for the fingerprints of God in the world. I will use my three-month sabbatical to reestablish the writing of poetry as a primary spiritual discipline in my life. To accomplish this I will: 1) explore and experiment with the spiritual practice of “poem journaling”; 2) study the poetry and life of Gerard Manley Hopkins, the “poet-priest,” whose juxtaposition of theology and art inspires this confluence in my own life; 3) work on The Cast, a unique collection of poems, called “sacrettes”, with accompanying commentaries, that depict selected Biblical characters; 4) pursue these goals in four distinct and purposeful environments: home, Hawaii, Wales, and the Pacific Northwest.