TURN UP THE OCEAN: POEMS, Tony Hoagland. Graywolf Press, 212 Third Avenue North, Suite 485, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55401, 2022, 85 pages, $16 paper, www.graywolfpress.org. I can’t resist the temptation—after the last poem in yesterday’s blogpost—to read and share Tony Hoagland’s posthumous collection, Turn Up the Ocean. Not to have every blogpost an elegy, but if you […]
ALMOST AN ELEGY: NEW & LATER SELECTED POEMS, Linda Pastan. W. W. Norton & Company, 500 5th Avenue, New York N. Y. 10110, 2022, 122 pages, $30 cloth, www.wwnorton.com. I began my research for this post by rereading Linda Pastan’s New York Times obituary. I could post a link and be done. The effusive praise you […]
I SING THE SALMON HOME: POEMS FROM WASHINGTON STATE, edited by Rena Priest. Empty Bowl Press, Chimacum, Washington, 2023, 275 pages, $20 paper, www.emptybowl.org. I don’t believe in magic. I believe in the sun and the stars, the water, the tides, the floods, the owls, the hawks flying, the river running, the wind talking. They’re […]
When my friend Madelon told me about this book, I was skeptical. A book about catching and killing moles? A philosophical, poetical book? Every summer, Madelon and I get together — at least a few times — to write. Admittedly, we don’t always write. We sit in her garden and talk. We sometimes walk. If […]