More in Time: A Tribute to Ted Kooser

by Jessica Poli (Editor), Marco Abel (Editor), Timothy Schaffert (Editor)

Overview

More in Time is a celebration and tribute to Ted Kooser, two-time U.S. Poet Laureate, winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, and Presidential Professor of the University of Nebraska. Through personal reflections, essays, and creative works both inspired by and dedicated to Kooser, this collection shines a light on the many ways the midwestern poet has affected others as a teacher, mentor, colleague, and friend, as well as a fellow writer and observer-of-the-world. The creative responses included in this volume are reflective of the impact Kooser has had in his connections to other writers, while also revealing glimpses of his distinct way of seeing.
 

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781496227911
Publisher:	Nebraska
Publication date:	03/01/2021
Pages:	228
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Jessica Poli is a graduate teaching assistant and doctoral student of creative writing in poetry at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. Marco Abel is the Willa Cather Professor of English and film studies at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln.  Timothy Schaffert is the Susan J. Rosowski Associate Professor of English and women’s and gender studies at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. Timothy Schaffert is the Susan J. Rosowski Associate Professor of English and director of the creative writing program at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. 
 

Table of Contents

Editorial Note    
Marco Abel, Jessica Poli, and Timothy Schaffert Acknowledgments    
Introduction: Splitting an Order, Ted Kooser, Copper Canyon, 2017    
Diane Glancy
Naomi Shihab Nye    
Ted Kooser Is My President Jill McCabe Johnson    
What Ted Likes
1,001 Things to Amend Before You Die—Excerpt 244–258 Marjorie Saiser    
Ted Is Writing This Morning Jehanne Dubrow    
From Description to Discovery
Pledge Mary K. Stillwell    
A Toast to Chance, Good Fortune, and Ted Kooser Amelia María de la Luz Montes    
Ted Kooser’s Near South History Tour
Platte River Andrea Hollander    
The Things Themselves
Old Snow Stephen Behrendt    
The Surprising Novelty of the Familiar: Ted Kooser’s Poetry Sarah McKinstry-Brown    
Supper with Amy Mark Sanders    
A Summer Letter to Old Friends Up North Sharon Chmielarz    
Aunt Bertha Suzanne Ohlmann    
Sustenance James Daniels    
The Crucial Lack of Redemption Sally Green    
Wildflower Samuel Green    
Feathering Mark Irwin    
The smaller house Ivan Young    
Translating Ted Kooser
Ferris Wheel Dana Gioia    
Discovering Ted Kooser (1980) Cody Lumpkin    
Old Man in the Hall of Nebraska Wildlife Christine Stewart-Nuñez    
My Poetry Foundation
Medical Arts Building, Watertown Robert Hedin    
Prunings Debra Nystrom    
Inland Sea Stuart Kestenbaum    
The Work at Hand Michelle Menting    
Absorbing the Moment
Ode to the Poster of Reptiles & Amphibians on the Exam Room Wall at the Animal Clinic on South Street Gerald Costanzo    
Conversing with Ted Kooser for Nearly Fifty Years Barbara Crooker    
Forsythia Todd Robinson    
Broken Summer Sonnet Faith Shearin    
Menagerie Hope Wabuke    
On Ted Kooser: Poet of Clarity & Sight
Afterwards Katie Schmid    
The Mechanic
Turning 32 Grace Bauer    
Summer Morning Walks: 4 Postcards for Ted Kooser Stacey Waite    
The Politics of Noticing: Ted Kooser in Poetry and Pedagogy James Crews    
More in Time: A Letter to Ted Trey Moody    
Good Morning
The Oriole Jessica Poli    
Holmes Lake Connie Wanek    
Sign Painter Twyla M. Hansen    
I Never Thought I’d Outlive My Evergreens Tami Haaland    
Sewing Room, 1973 Jeffrey Harrison    
Early Wonderment Peggy Shumaker    
Ted Talk Sarah A. Chavez    
Ted Kooser and the Act of Poetry as Life Practice
Home Again Saddiq Dzukogi    
To See Beyond the Self
Song to a Birdwoman Adrian Koesters    
“Late Summer”: Doing the Work and Giving the Gift Denise Banker    
At the Rehabilitation Hospital Biljana D. Obradović    
Tribute to Ted Kooser: “A Poem Has to Be Something More Than a Good Story”
Elegy for an Eastern Fallen Star Linda Parsons    
April Wish Mark Vinz    
Ted Kooser, the Midwest Small Press Poetry Renaissance of the 1960s and ’70s, and a Poem Inspired by Both
Great Plains JC Reilly    
Bathroom Spiders Freya Manfred    
When a Place Finds Voice Crystal S. Gibbins    
Writing toward Home
Lake of the Woods Jonathan Greene    
One Light to Another Dan Gerber    
In Praise of Ted Kooser Todd Davis    
Fishing with Nightcrawlers Hadara Bar-Nadav    
House Sandra Yanonne    
A Valentine Sonnet Joyce Sutphen    
At the Graveyard Rosemary Zumpfe    
Grace in Poetry
Making Ice Angels Rebecca Macijeski    
Making Sense, Making a Life
Time’s Beard, His Closest Thing to Seasons Amy Plettner    
How I Found Ted Maria Nazos    
Tuesdays with Ted Kooser: How I Found the Heart behind My Collection of Poems, Pulse
The Ghost’s Daughter Speaks Jonis Agee    
Mercurius Matt Mason    
Opening Night Rehearsal Judith Harris    
For Ted, On His Hiatus Karen Head    
Ready to Hold My Hand: Ted Kooser as Mentor and Friend
At the St. Elizabeth Mammography Center Jane Hirshfield    
Letter to TK: May 26, 2020 Kwame Dawes    
The Chronicler of Sorrows
Fences
Source Acknowledgments    
List of Contributors
 

Editorial Reviews

Ted’s office was a place of magic for me for the few years that I did tutorials with him. . . . He deeply respected the mystery that arose in the course of writing, the surprising element of the poem that a poet might not see herself, until an astute reader pointed it out.”—Katie Schmid, author of Nowhere

Katie Schmid

Ted Kooser’s poems are as natural and true as anything I know in American poetry. I love his honed-down style, his subtle humor, and his attention to a detail that will shine with kindness and grace by the end of the poem.”—Joyce Sutphen, author of Carrying Water to the Field

Joyce Sutphen

When I arrived in the U.S., I experienced an immense culture shock that was incredibly difficult to shake off, and it held me back, held my tongue back in my other classes. But each time I was in Ted’s presence, I grew fully into myself in ways that weren’t so apparent in his absence.”—Saddiq Dzukogi, author of Your Crib, My Qibla

Saddiq Dzukogi

Ted Kooser is kind, as we know from every essay and poem published in this volume to honor the poet’s retirement from the University of Nebraska. Ted Kooser is accomplished and beloved as teacher, writer, poet, editor, painter and friend. And Ted Kooser leaves the public life of the university as a national poet laureate and Pulitzer Prize winner to become what he has always been, a private man of genius. Long may he thrive and publish, labor in his fields, make and paint the birdhouses that adorn our trees, the gorgeous chicken coop in his yard, and write poems so distilled that our souls bend in delight.”—Hilda Raz, author of Letter from a Place I’ve Never Been: New and Collected Poems, 1986–2020 

Hilda Raz