Strangers & Pilgrims - by Alfred K Lamotte (Paperback)

About the Book

These poems express our estrangement from the heart, our longing for return, and our pilgrim journey to wholeness. Both humorous and poignant, they explore the liminal space between word and silence, poetry, and guided meditation.

Book Synopsis

These poems express our estrangement from the heart, our longing for return, and our pilgrim journey to wholeness. Sometimes humorous, sometimes poignant, they explore the liminal space between word and silence, poetry and guided meditation. Useful for individuals and groups seeking spiritual nourishment, the book is dedicated to Mary Magdalene, the archetypal pilgrim who journeyed south of France after the death of her beloved, Jesus, to bring his illuminating consciousness to the West. The author dedicates this book to her, who "lifts us up into our fallenness." Some of the poems reflect Nonduality. Others reflect a devotional yearning for the Beloved. Some poke fun at the new age spiritual marketplace, while others are full of reverence for sacred tradition.

The author advises us not to regard these as contradictions but as paradoxes. And when these poems peel away the layers of paradox, we discover that we may arrive at the goal of the pilgrimage with every step. We may breathe the divine with every inhalation. We may explore the wonders of the cosmos in this human body. The first poem embraces fear and helplessness at our present condition on earth; the rest, in various ways, respond to that despair, giving us hope and joy. The poems are rooted in earthly experience: "Get mud between your toes!" Yet they are filled with images and talismans from Hinduism, Judaism, Islam, and Christianity mystical traditions.

While these poems honor the mystical journey, they remind us that the way from the mind to the heart is a single breath, received as a gift of grace. While elevating our vision beyond the stars, these poems root our flesh in the ground under our feet. They remind us that our breath always leads us back to the place where we already are, in the miracle of the present moment. Alfred K. LaMotte is a college instructor in world religions and an experienced teacher of meditation who has spent a lifetime in the dialogue between Eastern and Western spiritual traditions. He has studied with meditation masters of India and in Benedictine monasteries in Europe and the U.S. This is the author's sixth volume of poetry, his fourth with Saint Julian Press.

Review Quotes

"Oh, these poems, how they move me, fragrant as they are with wonder, fear, embodiment, love, and sacred longing. Each page is an invitation to "awaken the one you already are." I've long loved Alfred K. LaMotte's work, and with this collection, I fall even more deeply in love with life, with truth, with great teachers, and with "the miraculous wings of the ordinary." After just ten minutes of reading Strangers and Pilgrims, I feel more human, more spacious, more at home, more light."

Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer

All the Honey & Host of The Poetic Path (Ritual App)

"I deeply admire Alfred K. LaMotte as a person and poet. The source he taps is a clear living spring of divine solace and inspired grace. Each book he creates seems to introduce the world to a new species of beauty. The energy in his words is resuscitation. Each poem is an oasis. Thank God for poets like him."

Chelan Harkin

Susceptible to Light and Bouquet of Stars

"Alfred K. LaMotte is a passionate seeker, a modern mystic in whose wild and tender heart springs devotion for the Sacred Feminine. He gives voice to the paradoxes of living embodied spirituality. In the prophetic poetic tradition of Rumi and Hafiz, he expresses an unfettered yearning for union with the Divine. His poems pulse with sparkling traces of his search for a fuller humanity, in the hope that they might kindle in you the courage to follow your own path and claim your inner treasure."

Kayleen Asbo, Ph.D.

"The world often estranges us from our hearts and distracts us with theatre and puppetry. But when I slow down, breathe, and read these poems with the respect they deserve, the words ring so strong they pull me back to my heart. These poems remind us why we are here: to deliberately choose divine Presence in every moment. They make the pain of living a wholehearted, spiritual, authentic life more bearable, reminding me that I am not alone. This brings solace in a way that nothing else can."

Abby Wynne

The Inner Compass Trilogy

"Fred is among the most prolific poets whose writings have touched and inspired me for many years. His poems are not dry intellectual discourses. They are medicine for the troubled world. They taste like spring water in the desert. The depth and simplicity from where his words spill wake us up and remove all our unnecessary worries and fear. Please come and rest inside the vastness of his offering!"

Guthema Roba

Song of Silence: Sacred Poems for Healing and Awakening

"I want to pull these poems around me so they might infuse my dreams. I want to hold them like a lens to better see the stars. Alfred LaMotte is such a wise yet wonder-filled writer!"

Laura Grace Weldon