We Are His Poets

Ralph Vile of Luray, Virginia, presents poems that he wrote from 1945 to 1961. This period encompassed his service in the U.S. Navy, college and seminary education, marriage and family, a call to the mission field, ill health, and a return to the Shenandoah Valley, where he and his wife, Joanna Griffith Vile, now live. They taught in public schools for many years and have been active laypersons at Mt. Carmel Regular Baptist Church. Ralph's poems center on the themes of home, family, God, Bible, church, and community. The author records his struggles with God's providence and his faith in His care. Even as they provide a backward glance at a time now gone by, these poems look confidently ahead to the future. They focus both on the beautiful visible world of nature and on the even more precious, once invisible, Word that was made flesh and dwelt among us.