DAVID HANIG
Poet. Author of “In Every Breath a Prayer”
AND
“Everything Bends Toward Love“
AVAILABLE NOW!
David Hanig’s new volume of poetry – Everything Bends Toward Love – was released in January 2025.
In 2016, after retiring from a 40-year career in health care policy, David Hanig embarked on a journey of personal growth. As part of this spiritual path, he took a hallucinogen, hoping to attain penetrating insights. Instead, the drug opened a hidden doorway in his mind, revealing years of repressed childhood trauma and leading to months of panic attacks and years of unrelenting anxiety. His subsequent spiritual odyssey, as he gradually emerged from profound darkness to illuminated grace, is chronicled in his first book – “In Every Breath a Prayer―a Journey of Healing in Verse and Prose“.
Through this period, Hanig was inspired to write several hundred poems, a few of which were included in his first book. Now, three years later, Hanig has selected a few dozen of these poems for a new book: “Everything Bends Toward Love“. In this collection, each poem is grounded in one of three mystical traditions – Judaism, Zen, or Sufism. While all have roots in mysticism, the poems vary in approach – some may challenge one’s beliefs; others may prompt laughter, but together they can provide guideposts to your own journey into the self. As one reader put it: “Your poems serve as a hypnotic induction, helping me to delve deeper into myself.
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“… if we embrace this quest, the Beloved may ever so gradually draw closer to us. If we are blessed, eventually we will cease our outward orientation and turn inward in our search. And, ultimately, if Grace prevails, the distance between us and the Beloved shrinks away to nothing. The Searcher, the Beloved and the Yearning – all merge to one.”
—Introduction- Everything Bends Toward Love
Praise for Everything Bends Toward Love:
“David Hanig takes us on a poetic exploration of the examined life, of suffering, and the mysteries of what is commonly called the self, the personality, or the ego. In this deeply contemplative work, seen through the three great lenses of Judaism, Zen, and Sufism, we observe a restless spirit moving, however fitfully at times, from the dark sufferings of a being driven by fear toward the freedom born of the experience that undeniably, the true self, the world, and everything bends toward the light of love.”
— Thomas A. Thomas, author of My Heart Is Not Asleep
“A rich testament to the power of creativity and the human spirit, Hanig’s collection is filled with stark, rousing poems that paint an intimate portrait of love, identity, and the ever-present need for empathy. In these vibrant poems of philosophy and spirituality, Hanig showcases a true talent for imbuing the smallest human details with authenticity and layered meanings. Overflowing with both accessible and abstract language, Everything Bends Toward Love is both intellectually stimulating and emotionally engaging, written with clear eyes and an open, curious heart.”
— John Sibley Williams, author of As One Fire Consumes Another
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
David Hanig grew up in Chicago and has since lived in the Pacific Northwest. For over four decades, he worked in public service: initially with community mental health programs and later as a senior manager in Washington State’s Medicaid program. Following six years as a Senior Policy Analyst for the state Senate, he served as a Vice-President of a national health care consulting firm. Now retired, he lives in Olympia, Washington, where he gardens, practices yoga and continues to study mysticism and write.
POETRY BLOG
A few years ago, in the midst of a profound spiritual passage, poems appeared — arriving as surprising guests that begged to accompany me on my journey. I became their transcriber. I learned that only metaphors, symbols, and unexpected word combinations could begin to express what was transpiring in my life. At first, the poems arrived hesitantly, but later they came in an explosive rush with ample tears, and, then, as more contemplative afterthoughts. To date 150 poems have visited.
Several recent poems have been published online. Take a look!
Below is a sampling of a few poems . . .
VIDEOS
A VIDEO LIBRARY OF POETRY READINGS
CONTACT
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David Hanig 