R.S+Gwynn

 R.S. Gwynn was born in Eden, North Carolina and attended Davidson College, where he earned a BA. Later, Gwynn attended the University of Arkansas to eventually earn an MA and MFA. Gwynn is the author of “No Word of Farewell: Selected Poems 1970-2000”, “The Narcissiad” (1982), and “The Drive-In” (1986). He currently is employed as a teacher at Lamar University and resides in Beaumont, Texas.

Coming from somewhere, somewhere far above her.
Gwynn wrote “God’s Secretary” describing a point of view for someone that works for God. The poem effectively illustrates a generalized feeling in loss of faith and reassurance. Gwynn created an organized and almost office-like feeling in this poem: one of God’s angels is his secretary, emails are used to represent prayers, phone calls are people crying for help, and even goes to describe the outside and weather! Gwynn articulates that the secretary’s “outbox doesn’t get much use” meaning God doesn’t answer prayers, and then goes on to say that she “puts on hold the umpteen-billionth call… Who wait, then disconnect” which is illustrate the fact that the common mans’ ‘call’ for help go unanswered. Then lines 5-8 describe a scene in which a helpless bird falls from a tree and she goes on to use word play saying “Will He be in today? God only knows”; which is very literal because only God knows if he himself will be in today. Lines 5-8 also illustrate when the secretary lost her faith in God; she goes on to call him distant and states that God will never love her or know her. While the secretary has already lost faith and has already pleaded for a sign that god needs her, lines 13-14 gives her a reassurance that God needs her. I chose this picture for this specific poem from the movie “Bruce Almighty” because this poem describes prayers in the same way as the movie does; it creates a modern twist that takes something complex and abstract and puts it into layman’s terms.