Through transcendent, lyric verse, the poems in House Under the Moon explore the spiritual struggle for harmony between the contemporary and contemplative life. Blending several religious traditions including Buddhism, Hinduism, Christian mysticism, and Sufism, Sowder’s poems achieve the essence of devotion—both familial and divine—as he graciously takes readers with him along the path to enlightenment.

Michael Sowder is the author of the T. S. Eliot Prize-winning book, The Empty Boat and two chapbook collections, A Calendar of Crows and Cafe Midnight. He also wrote about Walt Whitman’s poetry in Whitman’s Ecstatic Union. In addition to writing poetry, Sowder writes creative nonfiction about the human relationship to the natural world, and about Buddhism, Hinduism, Christian Mysticism. His essays have appeared in Shambhala Sun, The Wasatch Journal, The Walt Whitman Quarterly Review, and many other venues. Sowder is associate professor of English and adjunct professor of Religious Studies at Utah State Univeristy. He is a meditation teacher in the Cache Valley Buddhist Sangha and the Amrita Sangha for Integral Spirituality, of Cache Valley, Logan, Utah.