Poetry Books

People--especially the young--who are headed for the first time to the feast New York provides will appreciate the wit and wisdom of David Carroll, 'one time lad, now a druid sage.' He knows the menu! For those who have already partaken of New York, Carroll's poetry is a feast in itself. Marilou Awiakta

People--especially the young--who are headed for the first time to the feast New York provides will appreciate the wit and wisdom of David Carroll, 'one time lad, now a druid sage.' He knows the menu! For those who have already partaken of New York, Carroll's poetry is a feast in itself. Marilou Awiakta

New York: A Feast of Memories weaves a poignant path of poems highlighting the wondrous 20th Century history of the "Big Apple". H. Wm. Card, Jr.

David D. Carroll has captured with sensitivity, insight, and humor the exuberance of a New York of yesterday . E. Blagbrough

A delightful, nostalgic, rollicking remembrance of the wonders of New York, by one who knows it well. In his unique, masterful style of writing, and amazing powers of memory, David Donald Carroll has given us not only unforgettable pictures of New York but also of this remarkable nation. The book is vintage Americana at its best. Dr. J. Moreland

This book is worth the read. If you like Homer. You will love this book. It is like an add on to Homer. I tell everyone I meet to pick this book up.
Easy to read. A wonderful story and written with such grace.

Lesa Trapp

By all the gods on Mount Olympus, I have never seen mythology presented so clearly! A poet is dictionary-defined as: a person of imaginative power and sense of beauty; one who presents a subject in a unique way. Marc Ladewig truly has the soul of a poet. My favorite lines, (and there are many) are:
"The strands of god run deep in mortal man
and in the stars and every blade of grass."
Marc has a way of making the gods and their times come alive in a fascinating and memorable way. This epic tale itself is a work of art, the pictures make it even easier to envision the story and the afterword is a wonderful reference tool as well. With the map, the family tree and the glossary of names and places, further study is certainly made much easier. After reading this book, even those who are not poetically inclined will want to read more. I cannot recommend this book highly enough!

Watch Video Here: http://www.amazon.com/review/R9ILUHVJXE75V Odysseus Bids Farewell to Calypso is a video with original musical introduction by the author.

I have loved the tales of Homer since a child; reading everything I could get my hands on in my school's library about the Trojan war and the wanderings of Odysseus. My life choices were influenced by my internalization of the warrior ethos found in Homer's immortal poems.

But the old stories grew stale, and I have been unable to get back into them in decades.... Till Marc Ladewig's amazing retelling of the Oddyssey!

This is indeed Homer for a new generation of modern readers. Marc writes in clear and understandable poetic-prose. He serves-up the epic myth in the style of Homer, trimmed of the "fat" that weighs pure translations down for modern readers.

I recommend this book to any reader of any age who thrills to the ancient tales or who enjoyed the film "Troy". But especially I hope this book is picked-up by educators, who will find this a fine piece of literature and a great tool for introducing young minds to the world of Homer. To the "fierce-bred" heroes of ancient Greece; to lovely nymphs and cleaver wives; and to mega-hearted Odysseus, doomed to wander the wine-dark seas before at last returning to hearth and home.

With "Odysseus, the Epic Myth of the Hero," the California poet Marc Ladewig has undertaken a noble task: a contemporary retelling of the adventures of Odysseus (aka "Ulysses"). The ancient king of Ithaca's deeds were originally described by the Greek poet Homer in the 8th century B.C. in the epic poems "The Iliad" and "The Odyssey," which respectively depict the Trojan War and Odysseus's magical and harrowing journey home. The two works are still the most famous epic dramas of Western Civilization, their mythology permanently etched into our collective culture. We know the stories from the original Homer and from adaptations (such as Wolfgang Petersen's 2004 movie "Troy"), elaborate re-workings (James Joyce's "Ulysses" and Joel and Ethan Coen's "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" are examples), references in story and song (including Cream's "Tales of Brave Ulysses"), and innumerable renderings in painting and sculpture. Who has not heard of the Cyclops, Achilles' heel, the Lotus Eaters, the Sirens, or the Trojan horse?

So, it is with a chill up the spine and a rush of nostalgia that one reads Ladewig's opening words: "Sing about that long lost man for me, dear Muse of epic song...." And we plunge into the Homeric reality of legendary warriors and fierce battles, helpful and wrathful gods, oracular and vengeful wives and mothers, seductive goddesses and terrifying creatures, and the homesick Odysseus and his ever faithful wife Penelope. In Ladewig's book, "some parts are translation, some parts are adventures upon which Homer is silent, some parts are pure invention." He is true to the spirit of the original, yet strives to fill in gaps and to interpret. Ladewig, of course, is not the only author to augment Homer's accounts: Euripides and Aeschylus wrote plays more than two thousand years ago that dealt with characters from the Trojan War. For the 21st century, it helps to have a new telling that bridges the gap between the ancient and modern worlds, and their manners of storytelling. Ladewig succeeds admirably in this. His language is fresh and modern, his poetry is vivid and sweeping, and he retains an epic tone, transporting us to faraway, mythic events that have informed our dreams and our strivings for three millennia.

These poems are amazing, haunting, beautiful. Full of emotional quicksand to pull you down into a miasma of broken dreams, lost love, aching, joy and wishing for things just out of our reach. I will be giving this book as gifts over the holidays.

Poetry is a funny thing. Poems considered epic, famous or great usually put the reader to sleep. On the other hand, a saucy limerick scribbled on a bathroom wall might be remembered for a lifetime. So, when one opens a poetry book one usually expects the worst. These days, most poems tend to be long-winded, self-indulgent echoes of rock lyrics and soap-opera dialogue, and read like free-association bonanzas. Therefore, poetry is suspect from the word Go and carries an onus of high-falootin' ridiculousness. What a pleasure to come across a book of poetry with all the classical trappings of "great poetry," rendered in a hip, modern meter, that actually speaks to current states of mind.
At first glance, Michael Andros' new collection, On Cloudless Days The Insects Sing, presents a Victorian visage, but as one takes the trouble to read the individual poems therein, his looseness and aloofness becomes apparent. What at first glance seems formal turns out to be fun and erotic. Andros must be aware of his difficult situation, and he never shies away from addressing the architecture of his inspiration (in the poem And Uncertainties, Put Away he even says, "My dreams come, unbidden to me, in twilight..."). Andros shows us what the romanticism of the Twenty-first Century might look like. He draws on much that is established and cliched, yet the result winds up in new, unexplored territory. Anyone needing reassurance about the state of the art need only read such doozies as Her Scent Of Pine And Dogwood Trees or In You I Sail Forever.
Those familiar with Andros' previous work his hard-hitting sexy graphics and take-no-prisoners poems might expect something harsh in this book. Not the case. Andros' verbal versatility takes a different path. With lilting loveliness he caresses the senses. He lets it all hang out with everyday expressions of love and desire. He likes things the way they are but doesn't mind transforming himself into something new when necessary. Therein lies a lesson for today's wannabe poets: don't be afraid to let the past shape the future.

Wow, this is now my most cherished book of poetry! Imaginatively forceful. Dark and mysterious with deep expression of pain, loss and sensual longing. Making it a meaningful, eloquent, evocative gift for lovers and poetry lovers everywhere. I can't wait for this author's next book so I can start a collection of his beautiful work.

Usually I am not fond of poetry. Sometimes poets lay it on too thick, try too hard, or don't make sense. This book is art with words. It's not forced or simplistic. At the same time, it's not too fantastical as to be a contrived product, where "deep" poems all too often spiral out of control, sucked into a vortex of narcissism and irrelevance that is fueled by their creation. Michael Andros is a talented writer. His poems touched me deeply. These are poems created by an author who wears his heart on his sleeve, and the naked honesty made me ache on many levels.

If you are looking for a journey...and you can relate to passion,loss,pain,love,and words not spoken by most, definately pick up this book. I find myself impressed by his style and honesty. Poetry is meant to represents passion, and I found it in the writer.
Deborah

This book is a great intro to Mr. Qabbani's poetry. Everything about it is well done. Cover art, binding, paper stock. All excellent. This volume will have the reader searching for more of his work.

So powerful, so sensual, so incredible. His poetry is earth shaking and primal.

I had thought your love would end my estrangement
but you passed like water between my fingers

~Nizar Qabbani

In my eternal search for poetry infused with images of water and passion, "On Entering the Sea" appeared on the Amazon horizon. How I love this site and the ability to locate life-enhancing selections of great beauty.

The poetry of Nizar Qabbani requires atmosphere and an imagination willing to travel beyond the daily drudgery of existence into longings for home, passionate encounters and the mysteries of sensation. At times his poems have echoes of ancient works that intertwine themselves with modern complexity. His work celebrates the love of country, women and sensuous images of coffeehouses and Andalusian experiences.

I write
to save the woman I love
from the cities of no poetry,
of no love
the cities of frustration and gloom
I write to make her a misty cloud

Only woman and writing
Save us from death.

As an introduction to Nizar Qabbani, On Entering the Sea presents his work in a pleasing arrangement by translator. While the introduction by Salma Khadra Jayyusi presents an overview of the book, how I wished for a section at the end to explain the details behind many of the poems. Would this enhance my enjoyment or do the poems speak of moments so profound, no other explanation is needed? It could be said that many of his poems have a universal appeal and need no further explanation.

While his words glow with a love for the female essence in life and in women, he also explores thoughts of protecting his home, lands he loves and a different perspective on war and loss. "Posters" may be shocking to some and yet it is a representation of how Nizar Qabbani sees the world and wishes for peace all while declaring war on pride. It is highly political and yet he delves into the heart of freedom for all people. Although, I think there are poems I have yet to read which apparently display a more revolutionary approach, although this is not foreign to poets the world over. I enjoyed reading Jerusalem:

Jerusalem, beloved city of mine,
tomorrow your lemon trees will bloom,
your green stalks and branches rise up joyful,
and your eyes will laugh...

He experienced so much pain and loss and was very controversial, especially in his hometown in Damascus where he challenged cultural taboos. Too often I think we as a society have condemned the erotic, all while longing for erotic pleasures of our own. Nizar Qabbani not only sets desire free in poems, he sets women free from oppression. In "Diary of an Indifferent Woman," he writes as a woman:

I want to escape from my own skin
from my own voice, from my own language
and stray like the fragrance of gardens
I want to flee from my own shadow
and from all addresses

By the end of the poem he talks about crystal bottles with dead butterflies and the images become revelations of eternal struggles for independence and for the freedom to love. During his teenage years, his sister committed suicide, because she could not marry the man she loved.

Time after time Nizar Qabbani displays an exceptional understanding of what it means to be female all while revealing what it means to be a man. Insatiable physical love and ecstasy from the sheer vision of a woman become spiritual expressions of love for God himself. "The Book of Love" is worshipful and timeless.

The name of my love.
I wrote it on the water.
I did not know
That the wind rushes by without listening,
That names dissolve in the water.

He also asks: "What is Love?" Then he humorously explains how he cannot change the woman he loves for she is "a storm trapped in a bottle."

Most of the poems are pleasing and passionate, but there are poems displaying private pain and horror as love is ripped from his hands by the ravages of terror. He perfectly describes his grief in an unusual moment where he is standing in the rubble of an attack and remembers his wife and the cadence of her name.

As he finds her handbag in the rubble, we are convinced no man has ever loved his wife this deeply, and yet the universal message makes us realize how many have loved and lost and longed for a woman like Balquis Al-Rawi. The vision he paints of honey, jasmine moons, rubies and roses will remain in my memory for as long as I love poetry. As in many passionate poems, the feelings of the poet flowed through me and appeared in tears. His poem about his mother's death is equally poignant and we are left with the scent of coffee, cardamom seeds and orange blossom water.

If you are a lover of world poetry, the poems of Nizar Qabbani are essential reading. Through his poems you feel the ancient longings of all people in all lands and in his uncensored thoughts, we can truly experience life through his eyes. I can only hope more of his work is translated in the near future. The exciting element of his poetry is often how he absorbs experience and then defeats his own inner tyranny by writing exactly what he thinks to display the beauty of truth. You will hear echoes in his writing and realize how many contemporary spiritual teachers and poets have been students of his poetry.

To peace...

~The Rebecca Review

These are the most passioante poems ever written. Some wail after unrequited love. Some bemoan the one that got away or an opportunity missed or ruined by thier own action. Many express devotion to the love that is present.

And then there are the political poems of longing for a lost land, agony for the end of a way of life and indignation at injustice. He was a great advocate for women's rights, but that work is not included in this collection.

I do not undestand why Qabbani is not better known in the US. In my opinion, he is far superior to Neruda (who was my favorite before I knew Qabbani). Less cliches, but more direct at the same time. And you hear what he has to say and reflect "that is exactly my feeling in this situation, why did I not think of that expresion...could it be said in any other way?"

I discovered him overseas, a few days before he died. I was so distressed to hear of his death, even though I only was familiar with his work a few days. In the Arab world, musicians of all stripes and capabilities attempt to use his poems as lyrics for their music. He has poems for every mood and every problem, each of them speak straight to the soul with emotion. Even people who can not normally appreciate poetry will become obsessed with Qabbani, when reading this collection.

Don't let the fact that his words have been translated from their original Arabic dissuade you from believing that somehow the work isn't as honest as it should be. Qabbani's work is so powerful it hardly matter shwat language it is in. In short, easily read dollops of wit measured out with a voice of quiet urging, he has given us work that transcends time and politics, while being above-it-all.

"If you know a man
who loves you more than I
guide me to him
so I may first congratulate
hom on his constancy
and later, kill him."

If poetry ever had a Luther Vandross, it was Pablo Neruda. If it ever had a Barry White, it was Qabbani.

The CD in the back of this book is worth the cost. The graphics are ingaging and imaginative. The poems of Rumi are inspiring as always and will awaken your spirit.

I was fortunate to be present at a live performance of the Illumination Band, and the initial distribution of One Song, at a conference in Haverford in 2005. I've since bought and given away as gifts at least 12 copies of Green's book, and I love the IB. I think the juxtaposition of Rumi to bluegrass is a great expression of the inherent crossover nature and humor of Rumi. By all means get it, read it, listen to it.
(Rev) Hank Galganowicz

Spectacular! I am a Rumi scholar and I learned a great deal more from this fabulous presentation of the thoughts and works of Rumi as brought over from Persian by Coleman Barks. Michael Green's illuminations and his thoughts on the insights of Rumi are profound and relevant to understanding our spirituality and our humanness. Fantastic!

Michael Green's mastery of graphic design is the perfect complement to Rumi's mastery of mystical poetry.

I highly recommend this to everyone who loves mystical poetry and appreciates illuminated design...

PS - I don't consider the musical CD much of a value-add, but even if you didn't resonate with the music (as was the case with me), the book is well worth the expense.

An absolutely beautiful book!
The combination of the prose and the illustrations makes this book a treasure for generations to come!

Petersen's "One Year Book of Psalms:Devotionals" is an enjoyable read. It takes the appropriate amount of time with each Psalm. The shorter ones are given a day, while longer ones are broken up so that one really gets a chance to get into it. This can be used for personal reading and it could also be shared and done with a group. I highly recommend it.

If you are like me and find reading the bible sometimes too daunting a task, pick up this devotional and you get a little dose of spiritual blessing every day and in a format that you will relate to.

I love the book of Psalms and this is a great little devotional book. There is so much comfort and guidance in the Bible and I like the fact that this breaks Psalms down into bit size pieces to chew on all day long. I do wish the book was spiral bound though to make it stay open easier for my devotional study.... but then again I wish ALL books were spirial bound.

Not only do you get to read the psalms... but a nice explaination with each one as well. Very well written... it's worth a lot more than I paid for it!

Peterson's Book, 365 Days in the Psalms is excellent filled with good illustrations from ancient days as well as modern. Peterson does a fine job and I highly recommend this book for those who want to know God better.

Ann Everitt

Before reading this book, I didn't know anything about Oulipo....do you? If not, here's the gist: Oulipo are a bunch of slightly crazy people who want to find new and fun ways to write stuff. So, they create all these interesting and zany techniques to generate their writing...to me, it seems similar to how modern composers generate notes and rhythms using tone rows and stuff like that. This book is a "compendium" of these techniques, Oulipo authors, their works, etc. I think it's great. I'd recommend it to writers who want to try something new (as opposed to just writing "from the heart", or whatever) and I'd also recommend it to people who like modern, formalist type stuff. Have fun.

Rather than individually buying a variety of basic tools, consider getting the Oulipo Compendium, which contains all the essentials: screwdrivers, wrenches, pliers, detective-novel-plot-generation-cards, Raymond Queneau's sonnet matrix, etc. Part of the benefit of an oulipo compendium of this scope is that it comes with its own carrying case, includes just about everything you need for at-home brain surgery, and is organized alphabetically, in the form of a dictionary. Harry Mathews and Alastair Brotchie's home/auto/linguistic tool set meets all these needs and more. Fits both standard and metric sockets. Features basic Oulipo tool set, assorted sizes of screwdrivers and ice-picks, sestina modifiers, biographies of oulipo participants side-by-side with multiple permutations of the N+7 theorem, socket wrenches with 70 sockets and 5 fingers and toes, and an especially amusing photograph of Georges Perec wearing a saucy beard. Stores easily on bokshelf or in the trunk of your car for travel emergencies. Smite your enemy by inventing a law which turns "Y" into "A" whenever it is preceded by "ENEM". Recover language and see what it's like to not live as a slave to your mother's tongue.

What can I say of the Compendium, except that I wish I had known about it years ago when I was slogging through many a boring creative writing class asking, always, "Is this all we have?" Truly, there is another side to writing, a playful, divergent, fascinating side that gives the reader and the writer a world of untold possibility.

Reading this book was very like being allowed into the fold of the Ultra Cool Kids, finding them to be an evolved form of human, and being welcomed just the same. The history, writing, and exercises held in this volume should be read by everyone thinking of exploring experimental writing. If you are bored with the status quo--and how could you not be?--then this book is for you.

Oulipo is great! This book is just so full of STUFF. What they did was just spend a lot of time thinking of wild ways to inspire & direct writing, & what we're left with is this labyrinth of experimrents. For me, the one of the greatest things gleaned from Oulipo is just the general sense that therec are sooo many more conceptual & logistical systems out there that you haven't even touched upon yet but that are waiting.

If you ever come across Arthur Brand's little article on the Oulipo, cherish it. I read it back in the late 80s, in an anthology somewhere, and I've never been able to find it since. It whet my appetite for these crazy masters of restricted composition, who spend their time devising totally new ways to write. This isn't a book for the "poetry of everyday life" set, or writing workshop clones. It's a book, as Brand said, for "mad scientists, mathematicians, monster-makers and angels." It's a writer's encylopedia, stuffed with ideas, strategies, graphs, games, machines, etc for making poetry and fiction.

If, as Leslie Scalapino suggests in the introduction to this book, Philip Whalen's poetry is about how his consciousness worked and utilized language, so that each poem is a gestalt of his thinking in process, then I think we must add that Big ZEN HA HA is present, ever-present in the articulate artifacts this poet of the hole-in-the-shoe and the shaven head (and I hear sadly mortal heart gunked up and out of incarnation by casual eating habits) left behind. Every turn of a trope ends in an undercutting of intention and meaning in the same way that the polyvalency of BIG ZEN HA HA (think "koans" here), undermines single meaning in every sacral utterance of Zen scripture. Of the See No Evil, Speak No Evil, Hear No Evil, Big Three of Gary Snyder, Philip Whalen and Lew Welch, we pretty much understand the hooks on which Snyder and Welch hung their tambourines, but it's Whalen who seems the reticent, self-effacing, hard to clearly define (just as Zen is), guy. He comes across sometimes as a New York School Poet (though lacking the sophistication of an Ashbery or O'Hara but including all their allusions to pop culture), and sometimes as a collagist of texts, in a kind of casual West Coast surrealism, but always as a 5-to-75 cent word nihilist, ready with a stick of BIG ZEN HA HA to shatter the prisms he stacks up so carefully before phenomena to liberate the pure light of the momentary mind. (And sometimes his verbal gestures remind me of the outsider texts, as well as the outsider stance of Harry Partch.) I'm still reading Whalen's Overtime news, hoping to stick around long enough to hear him whine for a toy early in his next incarnation on the streets of Tomorrow.

This isn't some crumbling, dry keeper of the hallowed institution that is sometimes "poetry." It is sad that Whalen's works are so hard to come by these days.

Why aren't you reading this?

ON BEAR'S HEAD is a staple in my library of 20th Century poetry collections. Too often included in the same breath with Snyder, Kerouac and the beats, Whalen's work deserves to stand alone. This new collection is a must for anyone who appreciates true literary invention.

Philip Whalen is a national treasure, one of our most important living poets. This collection, masterfully assembled by Michael Rothenberg, is a great place to start if you're not familiar with Whalen's work, and a glorious visiting ground for those of us who have already discovered him. Don't let the word POETRY dissuade you. You will not be bored for a minute.

I didn't know much about Whalen's poetry until he died this year, but the terrific memorial reading for him here in San Francisco drove me to "Overtime" and man, what a find. The Beats were more learned than the 'first thought, best thought' aesthetic suggests, and Whalen's poems balance religion, philosophy and cranky Zen insight with a casual, conversational Americanese in a way few of his more famous contemporaries could touch. His poems draw from a deep past that embraces everything from ancient Chinese verse to classical music, but insist that it walk down the street in T-shirt and jeans. Whalen spent the last three decades of his life at the San Francisco Zen Center--his particular brand of Buddhism, so generous to human failings (starting always, comically, with his own) and never, ever doctrinaire, has to be one of the most attractive spins on Eastern religion I've read. Whalen was in it and of it, never above it. He gives the moment plenty of wiggle room in his writing, so that cats, friends and silly thoughts can all stray into the poems without being shoo'd out for art. Whatever Beat meant, Whalen shows it in about its best light. Poetry's a little thinner and more straight-laced with him gone.

Adam Blanks is an extraoridnarily talented individual and I had no choice but to follow in his footsteps. Through positive encouragement and a great deal of support, he continued writing as well as dreaming everyday about his one goal which was that of a publication. He finally was able to do it and his dream became a reality. His talent was now shared with the world. Ever since he was a teenager he has been creating countless journeys for us to take and it is indeed a glorious stroll through one's psyche. The imagery and the creativity in this book are just mindboggling. It is surprising to think about how hard it is to reach someone's soul but for Adam, this book shows that he has no problem reaching the soul and actually goes deeper than that. The cool thing about it is that I was reading these poems long before they were in this book and I still love them just as much as I did in the past. It has been his life long dream and I am extremely proud of him and his poetry will live on forever.

What a cool book. I've read it 5 times already! I Have a few poems that are my personal faves, but every one of them made me feel something. People keep asking me if they can borrow it, but I just tell them to go buy their own cuz I don't want to give it up! : )

Mr. Blanks definitely gets you thinking. Sometimes you have to wonder what HE was thinking. He has an uncanny ability to write without inhibition. I think that if these "paintings" in his mind really were paintings, they would be abstract! I absolutely enjoyed the read. I recommend that you give this one a try.

The book was honest and brilliant, vunerable and thoughtful. The author was uninhibited and gives you a look inside that few are able to reveal. Thank you Adam Blanks! I am a true fan. Looking forward to more!

It has been passed all over campus. All my friends thought that it was wierd that I was reading poetry, until they read it too. It was like Adam Blanks could see inside my mind. I could definately relate.

I began reading Deb's book and ended up reading it twice in the same night. I found so much wisdom and comfort in her words. I felt every word. She is truly a gifted writer. If you have not read her book "Pausing to catch my breath...", you should. It would also make a wonderful gift for your mother, sister or best girlfriend. Her poems speak to the heart. This is one book I would like to keep close and read when I am feeling down or need to know someone else out there understands.

Debra A Warren's, Pausing To Catch My Breath is a fabulous read!
As I perused each poem, I felt like I knew her family members and that I was one of the priviledged few who got a glimpse into her private diary of life. Her words captivate and encircle your heart and mind with each line of text. Debra's book is more than her poetry, it's her world and I am proud that I had the distinct honor of reading and critiquing such profound work. It's a must read for anyone who loves poetry and can appreciate life's lessons.

Terri Ann Armstrong
Author of My Soul Has Spoken

Debra A. Warren brings forth poems that are very creative adn inspirational. In this book she takes the reader through her life experiences with poetry that makes a person think about their own life experiences. You can feel the emotions she wants to convey in each and every poem. There are emotions of every kind expressed. I've enjoyed reading this book and would recommend any poetry lovers read it. It is a very good book.
Julie A. Bowles

I received Debra's book yesterday. With a hot cup of coffee, the kids asleep, and in my comfy lounge chair, I began reading.
I couldn't help myself, but to read the entire book. I didn't know what she'd be writing next, so I just keep reading and turning the pages.

Many of the author's poems that have touched her life, has touched mine, and I'm sure many other people. What she writes about is what happens to every woman at some point. Happiness, Sadness, Death, Heartache, and being Blessed with Children, and then Grandchilden. Her poems have the ability, though they came from her heart, to touch so many others.

I hope to see more of her work published. I truly enjoyed reading "Pausing to Catch my Breath".

"Pausing to Catch my Breath" warms the cockles of my heart. The author Debra A. Warren shares her innermost self and her life experiences in this beautifully written, captivating book of poetry. She weaves a poetic tales to which we all can relate.
Debra A. Warren has certainly found an effective way to reminisce about `Life Reflections,' `Family Ties,' and `the Ups and Downs of love.' We have all experienced these emotions, made the wishes and had our share of heart rending, life changing romances.
"Pausing to Catch my Breath' is lighthearted, insightful and thought invoking. It evokes memories of yesteryear. Kick back, relax or snuggle up with a cup of beverage of choice and a copy of "Pausing to Catch my Breath" and you will not be disappointed. It makes a beautiful gift for book lovers of all ages.
Pamela deLeon-Lewis