Veteran Upper School English teacher Michael Ortiz earned first place in the 2025 Annual Sacred Poetry Contest, hosted by the Catholic Literary Arts, a Houston-based organization. This year’s final judge was award-winning poet Sally Read, who selected the winners from a group of finalists. Alongside each poem, the poet included a sacred image to which the poem is a response. Mr. Ortiz wrote the following piece to accompany Eric Armusik’s painting, “Saint Jerome.”

 

Spring’s Fist

Hieronimo Speaks:

“More than usual spring hit me, a fist
unfolding its favorite word-trysts

so many times I swear I was in a sea
of seeds bursting through darkness,

punching open coffin lids, miracles
of leaf, bark, twig, bug spiracles,

like mantles flung in a hooray
off one’s shoulders, falling first

like a page falls to rise again in light,
now a hill of triumph, bright

witness to April’s riot, splayed
roots, a voice finding pitch or hum. 

(O Word in the words like fireflies
twirl in the wands of our desire.)

This perfect pitch has been my strife:
I stare at each page and see in shadow

leaves tangled in wry senses hidden
from me, reluctant to rise but bidden

by his words, to the wreaths
of praise encircling days and days.

His language is pollen, kernel, seed,
coaxed in silence, breeding

brows furrowing across each page,
angels laugh at my hook swiping

the air, rounds for a widow’s mite,
the clutch and hug of the light.”