BLACK GUM AGAINST THUNDER Robert

Arthur makes me nostalgic for places I've never been —The Virginian-Pilot Each rereading of this narrative delights me more. -- Pleasant Living Magazine...masterfully depicts life on and around the Chesapeake. -- Currents...Passionate knowled... Read more

Arthur makes me nostalgic for places I've never been —The Virginian-Pilot Each rereading of this narrative delights me more. -- Pleasant Living Magazine...masterfully depicts life on and around the Chesapeake. -- Currents...Passionate knowledge...keen observation. -- The News Journal, DelawareThe most evocative writing about the Chesapeake since Beautiful Swimmers -- David Poyer...as tough and genuine as a waterman's palm...these rhythms are the sway of boats on tide waters...wind, straining ropes, and snapping sails. -- Ghent Magazine...a powerful introduction to those who do not know the Bay...a delightful reminder for those who do. -- Eastern Shore News Attracting national and international attention, Arthur's work is a virtuoso performance of a wide variety of poetic forms and techniques, informed by an acute sense of drama and place.This first-ever collection includes the best of Robert P. Arthur's hundreds of poems written over a forty-year career. They include The Arrow, Wikipedia, The Poetess of Blue Streak Grill, Cattle Sleeping (or Sleeping Cattle), Appearances, Sunday Seizures, and poems in series: Vija's War, and Crazy Horse's Woman. Many are emotionally and intellectually charged monologues from the mouths of such diverse characters as disillusioned Jamestown settlers, Crazy Horse's death/love obsessed woman, a Latvian child caught up in World War II, Appalachian snake handlers, Chesapeake Bay watermen, Vincent van Gogh, traumatized children, and Arthur himself. Together, they immortalize a doomed natural world with unparalleled beauty.Accessible yet lyrical, these poems will move you whether you like other poetry or not. We are all murdered: all.... Arthur's poems focusing have been podcast from San Francisco and his poem/plays produced on stage in Virginia, Maryland, Washington D.C., Pennsylvania, New York City, and St. Petersburg, Russia. Less