Love If We Can Stand It

“It’s a really beautiful, haunting piece of work, and I am grateful to have it.”
-John Ashbery

“This book of moving and insightful poems is only 85 pages long, but it took me quite a time to finish it because I found almost all of the poems to be thought provoking and so I felt a need to reflect on them. I usually prefer to listen to poetry rather than to read it, but this collection really engaged me. Some of the poems are just a few words or lines long; others are a few verses, whilst three are short-story length, almost novel-like in their breadth and intensity. In many ways each is very different, and a wide range of emotions is expressed; love, joy, friendship, anger, humour, sadness, disappointment. However, what Bruce F. Kawin has captured in all of them, through his powerful and evocative use of language, is an exploration of what makes us sentient beings.

As a personal read I found the book to be very moving and satisfying, but I am finding it difficult to rate it for groups; all will depend on whether or not the members enjoy reading poetry. So, I am giving it 3*** although the range from 1-5 would be equally applicable!!” – Linda Hepworth, www.newbooksmag.com

Bruce F. Kawin is an American poet born in Los Angeles in 1945. He holds an AB in English from Columbia University, and an MFA in poetry and filmmaking and a PhD in modern literature and film from Cornell University. He studied under Kenneth Koch, A. R. Ammons and, informally, Denise Levertov. He is currently a professor of English and film at the University of Colorado at Boulder. His poems have appeared in “Epoch,” “Hanging Loose,” “The Paris Review” and other publications.