Born in April of '46, in Nashville, Tennessee, and raised all over the eastern half of the country, Bill retains a wandering nature, though he is firmly rooted in the gospel of God's grace. His homeland is heaven, but he serves as a roving ambassador to many places in the States. Until he was thirty years old, his life was aimless. He grew wild, like a weed. Married, but having one affair after another; well-employed, but throwing his money away on drugs and the fast life; Catholic, but unbelieving, Bill had not time for a God whom he feared. More accurately, whose judgment he feared. Far better to escape in any and every way possible, which he did religiously.
     Late in 1976, he was on the skids, life a shambles, business wrecked, marriage going nowhere, hope nonexistent. Bill had hurt his back, and would soon become permanently disabled. One night late he awakened to a strong desire to write. He arose and went downstairs, grabbing a legal pad and pen, and sat in a comfortable chair beside a window. Snow falling gently. Outside noises muted. The house utterly quiet. First one line came haltingly. Then another and another each following the other like waves rolling ceaselessly ashore. Within the space of a few minutes, Bill had written his first poem. He had no clue as to its meaning, but understood that it meant something. He titled it Reflections, and set about trying to determine what it meant, to no avail. For days, the poem gnawed at him, generating a desperation to understand it.
     He began showing it to his friends in the hope that someone else might be able to shed some light upon it. One of those friends, an attorney, mentioned that it had a messianic quality. Bill did not know what that meant exactly, but he knew that it was a religious word. He carried the poem to an office building on Music Row where a man he knew was employed. This man, Hugh Sherrill, was a deeply religious man, one who had spent the better part of forty years in serious Bible study. He made no attempt to explain the poem, but engaged Bill in a conversation that he never expected. 
     During the course of this conversation, philosophical issues kept arising. Bill was terribly troubled over the problem of crime and punishment. It seemed to him that no man in his right mind would do a thing that would bring about the sort of punishments that are common under civilized codes of law. He believed that any man who would commit crimes serious enough to result in long term incarceration must have some mental aberration that caused him to do whatever the crime was. Hugh saw his opening. He said, "Well, that's right. Paul said,
'That which I will to do, I do not do, and that which I will not to do is the very thing that I do. If, then, I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who does it, but sin that dwells in me.' "
Bill was floored. He was stunned. It was as though a light had suddenly been turned on, illuminating the glory of God's grace. He understood that men are not sinners because they sin, but simply because they are sinners. All at once he understood that it was necessary for Christ to die because no man was capable of keeping God's holy law. He understood what grace really meant -- unmerited favor from God. He knew that he was himself a sinner, inveterate, incorrigible, incurable, and that if his salvation depended upon his own good works, there was no way he could be saved. But he understood as well that Jesus had paid the full penalty for all his sins when He died on the cross; that was indeed the reason it was necessary for Him to die, that He might act as our substitute in paying our penalty for us, that we might be saved. All the weight of all the condemnation of all the years from all the priests and preachers he had ever heard was suddenly and completely lifted from his overburdened shoulders. He had no further reason for escape. He finally had learned the truth, and the truth had made him free. Shocked, he leaned against the doorjamb and said, "I see the Light!"
     Now, Bill certainly never planned to say such a thing. There had been many a morning when he had sat in Hugh's office ridiculing him for his beliefs. When he came that morning, he was not on a mission to be saved, but to find out what his strange poem meant. He needed to know what the term messianic meant. Now, everything had changed. He was a new creation, a new man, born of the Seed of God, and had an entirely new system of values and priorities. Where he had spent thirty plus years walking in complete blinding darkness, all of a sudden the world was awash in a terribly sweet light. While Hugh had never discussed the poem with him, Bill now understood very well what that poem meant. And he understood that writing would be a large part of his ministry from that point forward.
     Hugh advised him to go immediately and purchase a Scofield Reference Bible, which he did on his way from Hugh's office to his home that very day. What an odyssey began then! Bill started studying the Bible almost around the clock, feeding upon it with a voracious hunger, unable to be satisfied with enough. Whole books. Subject chain references. Footnote trails. Doctrine, doctrine, doctrine. Then came the deep study of theologians' writings. Poring over books about ancient kings and empires. Learning the ancient history of the Jewish people, God's chosen people, through whom would come the Messiah. Studying until he grasped the arcane field of Biblical prophecies. As much as he was able to absorb, the Holy Spirit fed his hungry soul.
For more than twenty years, Bill has continued to study. He declares that the more one learns, the larger the field becomes. The more one knows, the more he realizes how little he knows. The inexhaustible supply of the Bread of life found in the Word of God is ever refreshing, ever fresh, ever satisfying hunger and producing more hunger. Generating a thirst that is slaked only by the precious Water of life found between the covers of the Bible.
     No sooner saved himself than Bill began immediately to tell others of the marvels of God's amazing grace. Within a week, still a babe in Christ himself, he led his first soul to the Lord in the person of his brother. His life became a life of study and ministry, of spreading the gospel even as he learned it himself. As he progressed in the Word, counseling and teaching became beloved duties also. And all the while, Bill continued to write. Prodigiously. Voluminously. Prolifically.
A stickler for detail, Bill became a brutal editor of his own work. Cut this, throw that out. Start over on this and give up on that. slowly the volume of his work grew, yet he did not seek a publisher. His notion was that he would not have the wisdom to write anything to which he could shamelessly affix his name before he was sixty or seventy years old. Now, approaching sixty, Bill is willing to put a small sampling of his work out for public perusal. The reader will find below a number of links. Many will be to poems, a couple to prose pieces he has written, several to theological treatises, and one to excerpts from a book-length manuscript. Bill continues to write and to serve actively in ministry.

Please see the poetry menu, up and to the right...

Please note that all of the linked material is copyrighted, and has been registered with the copyright office in Washington. It is provided for your personal enjoyment and edification, but is not for publication or sale by anyone other than the author. Thank you.

Reflections

Credo

Morning Cup of Coffee

Behold the Butterfly

World War III

How Dim the Eyes

To Emily Dickinson

The Quiet Peace

Impressions

The Owl and I

Time Passes

I Sat on a Bench

Epitaph

The Tale of the Lackey-a-Doos

Light

On Guilt

The Bone of the Dome

The Shoal

The Drought

Till Love Has Paid the Toll

Later Rue the Morning

Some Love

Whisper in the Wind

The Battle of Gettysburg*

The Siege of Petersburg *

A Cloud of Blacker Dye

Balaam

Ecclesiastes

Little Man

To Metered Rhyme

The Poet's Lament

Sometimes

To Vanity

The Brazen Gate

Warm Against My Face

In Search of Reality

Boxcars of Beryl

Patterns in Gray

The Nation of the Beast

Excerpts from The Bride of Christ

* The two poems marked with asterisks are excerpted from a full-length biography of R.E. Lee in verse.  Those not familiar with the War Between the States may not be familiar with all the characters mentioned in the poems.