Abstract
With the four poems discussed in this essay, Rowan Williams brings us deep into a land of both likeness and unlikeness. These thoroughly incarnational poems are not besotted with the baby Jesus, but rather turn our attention to ourselves as incarnated beings, as incarnations of the incarnation. What trepidations does the incarnation bring with it? What responsibilities does it ask of us, require of us? With beauty of language and intrepidness of speech, Williams has put into verse profound theological, soteriological, and anthropological considerations. By doing so, he considerably widens our normal theological pathway into a sturdy trail (though not a paved avenue). Williams invites us to walk with him, poetry's walking stick in hand, as we together explore the vast, known, and mysterious beauties of our incarnated earth, our incarnated Lord familiar and unfamiliar, our incarnated lives.
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