The Poets We Return To is a Wednesday series on Ethical ELA, featuring writers reflecting on the poets whose words they return to and the ways those poems continue to work on their lives, teaching, and writing.

We continue today with Denise Krebs with Joseph Fasano.

Making Meaning with Joseph Fasano

By Denise R. Krebs 

Occasionally, my device holds me captive. I doomscroll the news, fitting securely into the latest silo of belief and truth that I, in my clicking, have managed to algorithm myself into. It’s like I have become an ogler in a dystopian simulation game. I’ve had a smart phone for a little over a decade, and with each passing year, the captivity only gets worse. 

When I read The Meaning of Your Life by Arthur C. Brooks, I was reminded that a meaningful life is found in “asking questions that can’t be googled, falling in love, seeking the divine, experiencing a sense of calling, immersing yourself in beauty, and embracing inevitable suffering.” Brooks writes an early chapter devoted to device addiction and how it limits people’s ability to find meaning in life. I could relate. 

During this past year, I am working harder to take Brooks’ advice and be a more ready participant in this miracle called life. I’ve taken up study in a paralegal program, returned to corporate worship, began reading sacred scriptures more seriously, and diligently spend more time in nature. I write more snail mail postcards and letters, make more artwork (mostly collages), enjoy more visual art and music, and write and read more poetry. 

The poet I return to is Joseph Fasano. Fasano is a poet, novelist, and educator. His writing reminds me of the breadth and depth of life, the highs and lows, the joys and pains of everyday existence. Fasano writes of life, all of life—big questions, love, faith, calling, art, music, parenthood, joy, beauty, suffering and more suffering. Meaning is found in all of it. 

I first learned of Joseph Fasano’s work when I saw his book: The Magic Words: Simple Poetry Prompts That Unlock the Creativity in Everyone. I have written to all these prompt poems at least once, and I’ve used his prompts with groups of writers for National Write Out events in Joshua Tree. Here is a poem I wrote recently from one of his fill-in-the-blank prompts:

Home

My home is not made of wealth
My heart is not made of haughtiness.
My soul is not made of certitude.
No, my home is a welcoming
Volume. No one can ban it.
I am there whenever I am hopeful.
I am there whenever I am brave.
I am there whenever I am loving.
Yes, you can enter. 
But first repeat after me:
My heart is not made of haughtiness.
My soul is not made of certitude. 
__________________________________
Prompt from The Magic Words, page 110.

I reached out to Joseph and asked if I could reprint a poem or if he had a word for us at Ethical ELA, and just as I expected/hoped he generously said yes. I talked with Joseph on the phone and asked about the challenge of juggling a full life, being a writer and an educator. (I know many reading this are trying to juggle, as well.) He agreed it’s a challenge, especially to fit in the writing…“You must make time to be a writer. Continuously preserve your passion. Follow your muse.” 

Joseph was a professor at the university level for 20 years, and now he has formed his own academy, Fasano Academy, which is based on educating the whole human being. He continues juggling his life as a father, educator, and writer, publishing several books in the last few years. Joseph is a generous sharer of his poems online, as you can see when you follow him. I hope you’ll take time to read my favorite Fasano poems: 

“Rumi”, “Pietà”, “Teaching My Son to Swim”, “Instructions for Having a Soul”,“For a Student Who Used AI to Write a Paper” and

The Land of Goshen
By Joseph Fasano

Now my father wades out through his last sleep
and kneels down for the good touch 
of his horses:

Cinnamon, Justice, Rum.

America has wrecked itself
with treachery,

but he waits,
he waits
for the waking,

and slowly, humbly, stumbling,

                 Justice comes.
__________________________
“The Land of Goshen,” reprinted with the permission of the author.

When I asked Joseph if he had a writing prompt he would like to leave with the Ethical ELA community, he didn’t hesitate. He shared, “Teachers have a natural gift of paying close attention, human attention. French philosopher Simone Weil said it well, ‘Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity.’” 

He then went on to suggest this writing prompt for you: ”Think about one particular student. Free write about what that student means to you. How can you help them? How are you not able to help them? Just write, paying close attention. This kind of writing is not for publication, but for the spiritual act of developing one’s ability to pay profound attention to the other, the vulnerability and power of the other.” 

You can read more of Joseph’s poems on Poets.org and on his Instagram account. His body of published work is growing each year, too. Here are his books:

Novels & Other Books 

How We Survive: A Guide to Being Human in a Time of AI (2027)
The Teacher (2025)
The Dark Heart of Every Wild Thing (2020)
The Swallows of Lunetto (2022)
Vincent (2015)

Poetry

The Magic Words: Simple Poetry Prompts That Unlock the Creativity in Everyone (2024)
The Last Song of the World (2024)
The Crossing (2018)
Inheritance (2014)
Fugue for Other Hands (2013)

Among other changes I’ve adopted this year, finding Joseph Fasano to return to has given me one more faith- and hope-filled alternative to doomscrolling. Here’s to a great year ahead for you, as you find poets to read and write beside, to return to again and again, and engage in all the other joys that give your life meaning. 

The Poets We Return To continues each Wednesday on Ethical ELA. Explore the series or write about a poet you return to.