Beyond Me
Poems about Spirit in Scripture, Psychotherapy, and Life
Foreword by Donald R. Ferrell
Imprint: Resource Publications
Beyond Me seeks to capture and convey the wonder, mystery, and healing power of the Divine Spirit and its activity in human beings, life, and relationships. This Divine Presence is often felt or glimpsed as Mystery--beyond us, yet within us--which grabs our attention and pulls us into a deeper and fuller exploration of what life and human existence is all about. As an ordained Presbyterian minister serving as a Pastoral Psychotherapist, Carroll E. Arkema is especially thrilled and fascinated to notice and then capture in his poems the congruency between psychodynamics, spiritual growth, and scriptural stories. His interdisciplinary perspective illuminates the complexity of the divine/human relationship, tracing how people change, heal, and are sanctified, while also resisting such change and growth. Personal experiences and scriptural accounts throw light on each other, and Arkema shows poetry to be a format capable of holding and integrating both.
Carroll E. Arkema (Calvin College; Princeton Theological Seminary; Blanton-Peale Graduate Institute) is an ordained Presbyterian minister serving as a Pastoral Psychotherapist and Marriage and Family Therapist in Ridgewood, NJ, and in Manhattan. He was a faculty member for sixteen years at the Blanton-Peale Graduate Institute's Psychotherapy Training Program, where he also served as Director of the Spirituality and Psychotherapy Program.
"Arkema's poetic reflections on his father's presence in his life, his beautiful poem on his mother's death, and other poems that evoke the living spirits of beloved family members quietly teach us how we, too, may experience the healing presence and agency of the divine Spirit. Becoming a poet has proven to be a wonderful extension of his caring and creative gifts as a pastoral psychotherapist."
--Donald Capps, Professor of Pastoral Theology Emeritus, Princeton Theological Seminary, Princeton, NJ
"This collection is stirring, reflective, transforming, and hopeful. With pastoral vulnerability, therapeutic wisdom, and scriptural introspection, Carroll Arkema offers a mirror in which we notice our longed-for-selves alongside our shadowy existence. In this mirror we meet God face-to-face, beckoning us to wholeness and deeper relationships. Finding rest in a divine Spirit that dwells and waits, Arkema's vulnerable remembering opens possible futures for us all."
--Jaco J. Hamman, Associate Professor of Religion, Psychology, and Culture, Vanderbilt Divinity School, Nashville, TN
"Each of these poems is extraordinarily accessible and leads us to discover in the commonplace glimpses of spiritual truths not stripped of religious content."
--Roger W. Plantikow, Pastoral Psychotherapist, Springfield, NJ
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