If I Didn't Love the River: Poems

In this virtuoso display of sonnets, free verse, prose poems, villanelles, ghazals, and aphorisms, People’s Poet Robert Priest makes it clear why the Pacific Rim Review has called him “surely the most imaginatively inventive poet in the country.” A profound meditation on love, death, sex, and sickness, If I Didn’t Love the River speaks directly to the polarizations of our time. Priest’s mastery of dark satire, lyric ebullience, erotic verse, and the pithy maxim is as gratifying as it is unique and will appeal to the yearning for poetry, which so often goes unsatisfied in the reading public. No emotional territory — from angst, anger, anguish, and despair to whimsical delight — is off-limits here. Intent on releasing reverberations from the full depths and heights of what it is to be human, this is Robert Priest at his protean best.

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If I Didn't Love the River: Poems

In this virtuoso display of sonnets, free verse, prose poems, villanelles, ghazals, and aphorisms, People’s Poet Robert Priest makes it clear why the Pacific Rim Review has called him “surely the most imaginatively inventive poet in the country.” A profound meditation on love, death, sex, and sickness, If I Didn’t Love the River speaks directly to the polarizations of our time. Priest’s mastery of dark satire, lyric ebullience, erotic verse, and the pithy maxim is as gratifying as it is unique and will appeal to the yearning for poetry, which so often goes unsatisfied in the reading public. No emotional territory — from angst, anger, anguish, and despair to whimsical delight — is off-limits here. Intent on releasing reverberations from the full depths and heights of what it is to be human, this is Robert Priest at his protean best.

14.99 In Stock
If I Didn't Love the River: Poems

If I Didn't Love the River: Poems

by Robert Priest
If I Didn't Love the River: Poems

If I Didn't Love the River: Poems

by Robert Priest

eBook

$14.99 

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Overview

In this virtuoso display of sonnets, free verse, prose poems, villanelles, ghazals, and aphorisms, People’s Poet Robert Priest makes it clear why the Pacific Rim Review has called him “surely the most imaginatively inventive poet in the country.” A profound meditation on love, death, sex, and sickness, If I Didn’t Love the River speaks directly to the polarizations of our time. Priest’s mastery of dark satire, lyric ebullience, erotic verse, and the pithy maxim is as gratifying as it is unique and will appeal to the yearning for poetry, which so often goes unsatisfied in the reading public. No emotional territory — from angst, anger, anguish, and despair to whimsical delight — is off-limits here. Intent on releasing reverberations from the full depths and heights of what it is to be human, this is Robert Priest at his protean best.


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781778520501
Publisher: ECW Press
Publication date: 09/20/2022
Sold by: Barnes & Noble
Format: eBook
Pages: 136
File size: 2 MB

About the Author

Robert Priest’s words have been debated in the legislature, posted on buses, quoted in the Farmers’ Almanac, and turned into a hit song. His book Reading the Bible Backwards peaked at number two on the Canadian poetry charts, outsold only by Leonard Cohen. He lives in Toronto, ON.

Read an Excerpt

Love Has Nothing to Do

Love has nothing to do with the stars
except that I see them as symbols of distance
and love can be distant

It has nothing to do with rivers
but I see the river staying and going
and I remember that love leaves and remains

Love is not much swayed by the moon
but who can view the moon
and not think of love’s satellite tendencies
its shadowy diminishments

True fire — the flame is not love
but in its dance, in the light it sheds
we see what we become
when love is in us

If I Didn’t Love the River

If I didn’t love the river
how could I say I love you
If I didn’t wish for the world to thrive
If I didn’t work to change minds
that wouldn’t be love
I love you because I love tomorrow
and I want to keep it just a day away forever
If I saw hunger and didn’t dream of a feast
If I didn’t dream of children well-nourished
what would nourish my love
What would my longing for peace grow fat on
My love of justice is all wound up in my love for you
It wouldn’t be love if I didn’t love creatures running free
if I didn’t support the right of others to love
It wouldn’t be love if I gave away my voice
so others could add it to the mob
There has to be work to it, there has to be vision
If I didn’t love the scorned, the othered
If I didn’t love the children of war
how could I truly say I love anyone

Table of Contents

Love Has Nothing to Do 1

If I Didn't Love the River 2

Confession 3

Between a Tender and a Tender Place 4

On Star Divination 5

I Want to Go Back 6

So Close 7

Love Lets Love Shout 9

Misunderstanding 11

Seeking Itself 13

They Won't Stay In 14

Egalitarian 15

Depression 16

Why I See a Therapist 17

Amnesia 20

Name It Ghazal 23

Another Victim of Grammar 24

Device 25

The Like Process 28

Big Money 30

Preparations for the Catastrophe 32

What the Albatross Has Round Its Neck 33

Ravine 34

On the Way to the Walbran Forest 35

Beasts of Burden 36

Chimp with Organ 37

Still Life with Girl Diving 38

The Great Canadian Oath of Silence 39

Your Brand New Bag 41

Everyone Knows Where They Were When They First Heard about the Death of the World 42

What Is Missing 44

Monstrosity 45

Peacenik 46

Hunger Knows No Lockdown 47

Final Comedy Routine 48

Loving My Enemy 49

Infection Prevention for Murderers 51

Help 52

Idea for Genetic Engineering 54

Deglobaiized Violin 55

Shane Swallowed the World 58

What Franceses Does to English 60

Way Too Old 62

Keyhole Telescopic 63

Adoration 64

Head 66

For Francesca with a Broken Heart 67

Thigh 69

B.A.S.D. 70

Sonnet of Many Skins 71

Whinge 72

It's Not Your Fault 73

Over-Reacher 74

Nothingness in Us 75

The Name Is Bomb, James Bomb 76

Thought/Fat Meme Splice Sonnet 77

In the Future 78

My Women Named Marsha Kirzner Thing 80

Nothing Made This Love Inevitable 82

Eitan Means Strong 83

Too Much Like Heaven 85

Clock of One Word 88

You Were There 90

Against Love 91

Two Sheets on a Line 93

Caregiver 94

Information 95

Jade 96

For Marsha Taking Smaller Portions 97

In Order To Be Silent 98

I Find My Way In 99

Progression of Buts 102

I Slip My Will 103

Materials for an Interconnected Nest 105

In-Body Experience 107

Smiles 109

Go Free and Gentle 111

Micropoems 112

A Toast at Midnight 119

Acknowledgements 121

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