I’ve been trying to tell stories since I started a school newspaper produced on tractor-feed paper in the dot-matrix printer at my dad’s office back in 5th grade. The more things change, the more they stay the same.
I started this project in the midst of a full-time job, settling in to new rhythms after I was completing a mid-life graduate degree, parenting four daughters with my wife, and being a serial entrepreneur of non-remunerative community enterprises. I made no claims to the quality of work that would make it here, but committed to posting something here at least weekly, whether a poem, an essay, a link to something I’ve published elsewhere, a musing on current events, an interaction with someone else’s work, a photograph, or a snippet of thought from a larger project.
I’m still doing what I set out to do here, and I’m all in for the conversation and questions that the work and your responses to it as we figure out what it means to be alive under the sun together.
My poems and essays often explores nature, literature, and the church's ongoing struggle to live out the way of Jesus. I often submit poems and other pieces around to various publications, as well as write book reviews and pieces on assignment. You can see those other publications at https://jryanlonas.com/other-work/
As these threads coalesce toward larger projects (like books), You’ll here it here first. I’m also on IG & threads (@jryanlonaswrites) and Bluesky (@jryanlonas.bsky.social), but increasingly folding my online life into Substack.
About Me
I’m a poet, writer, cook, hiker, and amateur theologian. I’ve done some rounds in academic life, and hold an M.Div. from Reformed Theological Seminary in Atlanta. I live in Chattanooga, Tennessee with my wife Rachel and our family. By day, I serve churches and ministry organizations around the world through a nonprofit ministry based in here in town. I do a lot of writing of blog posts, video scripts, curriculum, etc. for my job, as well as a good bit of speaking and training.
I’ve been in Chattanooga for nearly 20 years now, but I think of myself broadly as a Southerner—splitting my childhood between the Deep South and more upland/Appalachian regions—so it’s fitting to call a place home where the various streams of Southern culture mix freely. A lot of my perspective is shaped by an understanding that this region holds some deep clues to American life as a whole, both for good and for ill.
I enjoy photography, and dabble in watercolor, so most of the pictures you see on the site (with the exception of book covers and classical works of art) are original works unless otherwise noted.
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