Poet, historian, and philosopher Jennifer Michael Hecht has a self-described “poetic way of understanding the world.” Raised Jewish in a Catholic world, she abandoned any notion of god and religion at an early age.
“At some point, you don't believe any of the things you've been told about who you are and where you are,” says Hecht.
Jonathan Bastian talks with Hecht, author of “The Wonder Paradox: Embracing the Weirdness of Existence and the Poetry of Our Lives,” about how poetry is “a portable cathedral.” She says that even the most ardent non-believers yearn for some of the things religion has to offer: traditions and rituals, community and humanity, and ways to describe that which we hold most sacred — or words to describe something utterly indescribable.
Hecht also opens up about her struggles with depression and suicidal ideation and finding hope through love.
“You're loved, and it's not up to you to decide whether to kill yourself,” she says.
Hecht argues that a single poem, whether for a wedding, birth, or funeral, offers a practical guide to a richer, more intentional life, and is often the result of hard-won personal wisdom.
“Outside religion, brilliant, sensitive, spiritual, poetic people have built a world of art and love and ideas. We just need to take that little extra step and see that all of it is a kind of poetic practice, and that your life means something,” she says. “It means something to you, and it means something to the people around you, and it means something to the human story.”
Hecht, pictured here, argues that a single poem, whether for a wedding, birth, or funeral, offers a practical guide to a richer, more intentional life. Photo by Max Hecht Chaneski.
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