There are seasons to life and seasons to writing. Nick Lindborg shares spirituality and spiritual encounters, moments in nature and reflection on the past in his book “Tangleblooms” released through Squares & Rebels last September. He will have his first ever Q&A and book signing Saturday from 5 to 8 p.m. at Fizz & Fiction.

A native of Cedar Rapids, he wrote his first poem as an adolescent. He’s lived in Marshalltown the last seven years, marrying his husband Scott in 2022. He’s employed as a full-time substitute teacher at Miller Middle School and serves as a warden at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Marshalltown.

While he earned an undergrad degree in linguistics, he decided to go on to study theology.

“Pretty common among all writers, I find language to be endlessly fascinating, and more specifically, I find the mechanism and the clockwork of language to be endlessly fascinating,” he said. “I then felt the call most of the way into an undergrad to go to seminary to become a priest in the Episcopal tradition, which I have belonged to since college. I went to Princeton Seminary and did a double degree — one of which I finished, but did all the work for both of — a Master of Divinity and a Master of Arts in Christian Education.”

For a time, Lindborg worked as a hospital and hospice chaplain, but the duties were sidelined due to the COVID-19 pandemic. He then turned to education. He notes no two days are alike when it comes to teaching middle schoolers. After joining an online creative writing group he got connected with his future publisher Squares & Rebels. The entity was created by Handtype Press with a goal of publishing books initially about the LGBT experience in the Midwest, and has since expanded the focus to include books that explore the queer and/or disability experience regardless of one’s region of origin, according to its website.

“I’ve always been interested in spirituality. I was raised in a devout Christian home, no longer my tradition. I was raised much more conservative,” he said. “I had to do a lot of re-analyzing of faith and spirituality and that seems to be a never-ending thing, and I think that fact is probably healthy.”

“Tangleblooms” exclusively contains poems and is classified as a chapbook (short books that are usually between 15 to 40 pages, give or take). Lindborg noted his book is volume nine in the series, with them all eventually being compiled into a larger work.

“I think every poet should try and write stories, and I think every fiction writer, or even non-fiction writer, should write poems, because storytelling is the common heritage of all humans,” he said. “Poetry isn’t just a structure, it’s a way of seeing. We are our stories.”

He noted that the book’s title is filled with meaning.

“How my poetry stands in relation to me feels like walking through the woods, and every poem is a clearing where I walk and behold what’s around me and can sit and ponder a minute. I don’t have particular axes to grind, I have a walk to go on, to take people on,” he said. “It seems in the most intense or unexpected moments, something becomes clear. There comes an inflection point, and it can be an opportunity for beauty. Life is a tangle of moments, hurts, joys, regrets, wonders, confusion, and out of it still comes beauty.”

Lindborg estimates he’s penned a few hundred poems in his lifetime.

“You go through seasons of more prolific writing, or times with writer’s block. I’m sad to say that, in terms of new work, I haven’t been producing a lot the last few years, but I have been revising old work into new with much more efficacy, and from both those efforts I feel like I have enough material — that isn’t already published — ready to go for two more chapbooks,” he said.

Looking to the future, Lindborg said he plans to apply to the Writers Workshop at the University of Iowa to earn an MFA degree.

The book is available to purchase at Fizz & Fiction, him directly and via the publisher at: www.squaresandrebels.com.