Tread Softly

After living on the Arabian Peninsula and the Tibetan Plateau, in the Everglades (as a poet-in-residence), in Macau, Thailand, and Chengdu, China-a city so polluted the sun seldom breaks through the smog to shine-Diana Woodcock now follows Christina Georgina Rossetti's mandate, "Tread softly! All the earth is holy ground." This, her third collection of poems, was inspired by it. Perhaps for a poet who grew up memorizing nature psalms of the Old Testament and singing "This is My Father's World," it was inevitable that her poetry eventually would take a turn toward ecological concerns, merging her spirituality with her love for all earthly beings.