The Leaning Tree
The Leaning Tree, Patrick Overton, Author
These poems, written in the author’s early-to-mid-twenties, represent a formative period in the author’s life. Throughout the years since this collection was published, a number of these poems have been put to music for choral presentation. One of them, “Faith,” has had music composed for three different choral presentations.
From the Foreword by Thomas J. Liggett, former President of Christian Theological Seminary:
“With insight and sensitivity which transcend his youth, Patrick Overton has pointed us to the ageless dimensions of human experience. The sequence of “separation, decision, life as, death, and resurrection” embraces much of what it means to experience life in both its depths and heights. The finitude, pathos, challenge, and triumph of human experience are all here. The are recognized, described, affirmed, and held together in a comprehensive view. The “Far-off whisper of eternity” has been heard and echoed.
These poems not only attract and hold the reader – they have a “lingering quality” that persists beyond the final line. . .The heart and mind are opened to a Reality that calls one, persistently, to reach out to what lies beyond, to search for what lies beneath and to become that “someone that he could never have been alone.” Depths are stirred that will not be the same again.”