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Good morning. Today is National Poetry Day and this year’s theme is truth. I think there’s a strong case to be made that poetry can sometimes express truth in a unique way. In fact much of the appeal of poetry comes from the way it can encapsulate ideas with particular power and focus.  My father started life as a toolmaker.  It involved a long hard apprenticeship learning to make very precise and complicated machine tools for very special purposes. These days the work is mostly done by computer-controlled machines.  For a while after he qualified he was unemployed and – maybe out of boredom - he and his friend Ronnie, discovered poetry – in their case, being in Scotland - Robert Burns.  And there they found the same precision and delicacy with words that they had with metal. It came as a revelation to them and they learned pages of it by heart - Dad could still recite it years later. And for me that clearly shows the potential power of poetry.  At its best it can turn ideas into words that really say what we want to but with pin-point precision. For example, poetry and particularly songs that come directly from and speak for neglected or disadvantaged communities often tell powerful truths in language that is precise and memorable.  And that can have  real impact. A s a Christian, I am daily grateful to prayer  and hymn writers who can put into words feelings that I have but otherwise would find hard to express. So today feels like the right day to celebrate the work, the importance and the gifts of poets down the ages.  Lord we thank you for the gifts of those who take the words we use every day and turn them into something beautiful, something truthful and something powerful. Amen