Today, I shifted the heavy marble, for Jim Bennett, Canadian Poet, to take up residence among my favorites.Īfter several re-readings, Bennett’s fifth volume: Retirement Clock: Poems 5 was not an easy read, hitting home on so many fronts: Retiring from ‘being somebody,’ wilting away like autumn leaves, ashamed of our cruel world. Carl Sandburg, too, amuses while Maya Angelou accuses.
There, they reign, my poets: Goethe, Schiller, Grillparzer. On my shelf, a heavy bookend holds treasured volumes tight against intrusion. After several re-readings, Bennett’s fifth volume: Retirement Clock: Poems 5 was not an easy A Book of Haunting and Powerful Poetry Today, I shifted the heavy marble, for Jim Bennett, Canadian Poet, to take up residence among my favorites.
You’ll figure this out, as these poems were written for you.moreĪ Book of Haunting and Powerful Poetry On my shelf, a heavy bookend holds treasured volumes tight against intrusion. You’re encouraged to explore the multiple meanings. They were not gentle, but they were thorough, and for this I thank them.Īs always, ambiguity may be present. The result was tested with my severest critics-members of my writing group.
Retirement Clock includes 54 somewhat longer poems, including free verse, cinquains, multiple cinquains, rondeaux, rhymed verse, one lyric, one mirror, and a compound poem-chosen around a theme. Others were written purely for fun, and there is at least one enigmatic poem in Moon Dreamer. Some of the poems are clearly historic: in one piece, what it was like to camp ‘wild’ before development took over is captured. If you have a friend or relative in that situation, it will help you gather a clearer idea of what they are going through. If you are approaching or of retirement age, these poems will speak directly to you. Retirement Clock explores retirement, the past, and regret for the passing of time.
It has the power to deliver experience to you. Sad and scary events in the United States, and a couple of Canadian tragedies too. What would happen if the clock ran backward? This is a volume of other times, of the cold war, of bomb shelters and nuclear submarines, of Formula One races at Watkins Glen. 54 poems on the topic of past and present.