Travel In My Borrowed Lives: New and Selected Poems
"Poetry is a language adequate to experience, and the range of a poet's career will vary with the range of experience that he or she faces. Donald Everett Axinn has been writing poems for nearly half a century, and he has faced up to many things. Travel in My Borrowed Lives brings together a wide selection of his best work, drawn from different places in his writing life. Axinn shows an admirable consistency in his very human concerns: his love of nature, his affection for family and friends, his wish to explore regions of mind as well as regions of sky."
--Jay Parini
Excerpts:
"First The Clowns"
"Change as a Curved Equation"
"The Colors of Infinity"
"The Bed"
Walking Through The Night
"...Don Axinn...thinks in language the way Donne and Marvell did, so that the geometry of curves and lines, heights and perspectives, comes alive: phrases like 'It comes down to' and 'gravity' take on the extra vibrations known as poetry."
-- Robert Pinsky, Poet Laureate
"The tender preciion of Donald Axinn's poems never fails to delight me. He is one of the few poets who celebrates the joy of being alive."
-- Erica Jong, Author
Excerpts:
"Connecting Clouds and Stones"
"Jones Beach"
"Like Ghosts with Nothing to Say"
"Poems as a Bridge to Morning"
"Walking Through the Night"
Change as a Curved Equation
"The poems are sometimes playful and teasing, sometimes heartfelt, sometimes meditative... the voice behind the poems remains consistent, and is recognizable as that of Donald Everett Axinn, a writer who has cultivated a special tone and sensibility over many years. Change as a Curved Equation represents an admirable addition to that sensibility, modifying and extending themes previously examined."
-- Jay Parini
Excerpts:
"Washed in the Flame of a Small Galaxy"
"Reverie"
"First Love"
The Latest Illusion
"Here's what I admire about Donald Axinn's new book: the human facts of our lives, the poet's unflinching gaze, the tongue that reshapes and sings it back to us. Wandering amid these nervous days, his generous verse finds us and pulls us home."
-- Cornelius Eady
Excerpts:
"George 'Ace' Alligator (Missisippiensis), Now Residing in Florida"
"This is What You Get"
The Colors of Infinity
"A rich bundle... Like an observer sent to find out, he brings back specifics from a wonderfully varied human habitat. Axinn offers the gift of borrowed lives to his readers."
-- William Stafford
Excerpts:
"Stearman"
"To Touch the Clouds"
Dawn Patrol
"I much admire in Axinn the capacity to share with his reader his experiences as a pilot. I, too, have tried but failed to do so in poetry. And, for this reason, I have attempted to recount my experiences as a pilot during World War II only in prose."
-- Nat Scammaca
Excerpt:
"Old Pilots in Springtime"
Against Gravity
"...Axinn opens the throttle on his lyrics: subjects of nature, culture, family, the meaning of a man's life, and, of course, flying, are treated in the ordinary language and confident tones his earlier work have led us to expect."
-- Molly Peacock
Excerpts:
"Tree"
"Clouds"
"In the Fall, Fire in the Trees"
The Hawk's Dream
"The tender precision of Donald Axinn's poems never fails to delight me. He is one of the few poets who celebrates the joy of being alive."
-- Erica Jong
Excerpts:
"Rachel"
"Saturday Night"
Sliding down the Wind
"His poetry can be playful, musical, reflective, probing... sometimes darkened by a sense of injustice and lienation, or gleaming with wonder and surprise."
-- Lisa Shea, Newsday
Excerpts:
"Land Of My Fathers"
"Ode To Aaron Copeland"
This webpage designed by Kinoini(sRS)