Alternating between grand, Whitmanic tone and scope, Dickinsonian minute detail, Beat rhythms, New York School wit and Objectivist sensibility, this epic poem engages traditional lyricism with a breathtaking contemporary style and graceful urgency.A native of California, Eleni Sikelianos has lived in New York City, Paris and Athens. She is the author of the poetry collection, Earliest Worlds, the memoir, Book of Jon (forthcoming from City Lights), and the National Poetry Series award-winning collection The Monster Lives of Boys and Girls.

    In “Bhagavad Gita for Beginners: The Song of God in Simplified Prose,” author Edward Viljoen uses contemporary, simplified language to bring this inspiring work to life. That which seems to be forcing people to act in selfish--even evil--ways is really the accumulation of desires coming together in a strong, irresistible appetite for self-satisfaction. These desires are rooted in the senses, and sense information can be misleading. More powerful than the senses, though, is the mind. And more powerful than the mind is the will (or intellect), and that which is above it all,--the Real Self, that part of us not deluded by the information of the sense world. The Bhagavad Gita For Beginners: The Song Of God In Simplified Prose will inspire uninitiated readers of the Bhagavad-Gita to delve into the original text, as well as bring a newly-found clarity and perspective to those already familiar with it.

    The Book of Craw -- comprised of poems and proverbs from Craw's own notebook -- is the companion volume to The Dirty Parts of the Bible: A Novel.

    Dinh's gift is for constructing, in the manner of Italo Calvino, simple narratives that quickly frame larger questions; with a poet's timing, the author builds his stories to the one or few climactic sentences that brand them with unforgettable meaning. In one tale, a Vietnamese boy's self-guided, haphazard study of English gives way to a meditation on the universality of language: Everything seems chaotic at first, but nothing is chaotic. One can read anything: ants crawling on the ground; pimples on a face; trees in a forest. In another story, a man opens a newspaper and sees the photograph of a man he may have murdered, which he impulsively clips, only to feel that in doing so he unwittingly has sealed his crime: As soon as I finished, I realized what I had done: by cutting my father's likeness out of the newspaper, I had removed him from the world. The collection crescendoes in displays of raw creative power, as in Eight Plots, a rapid-fire of three- and four-sentence summaries, and the brilliant, impressionistic !Blood and Soap is an arresting collection from one of a small number of writers on the vanguard of American fiction.

    Each anthology in the Staying Alive trilogy has 500 poems to touch the heart, stir the mind and fire the spirit. These books have been enormously popular with readers, especially as gift books and bedside companions. The poems - by writers from many parts of the world - have emotional power, intellectual edge and playful wit. This new pocketbook selection of 100 essential poems from the trilogy is a Staying Alive travel companion (also available as an e-book). As well as selecting favourite poems from the trilogy - readers' and writers' choices as well as his own favourites - editor Neil Astley provides background notes on the poets and poems. This format makes it even more suitable as a gift book for all those people you're sure would love modern poetry if only they were familiar with these kinds of poems. These essential poems are all about being human, being alive and staying alive: about love and loss; fear and longing; hurt and wonder; war and death; grief and suffering; birth, growing up and family; time, ageing and mortality; memory, self and identity; faith, hope and belief; acceptance of inadequacy and making do - all of human life in a hundred highly individual, universal poems.

    Second printing, 1984, The Institute For Earth Education, IL, Paperback, Book Condition: UsedVeryGood, 012164 1B

    After being ejected as collateral via my parent's breakup; After being lied to, cheated on and subtracted from all equations of love; I determined that things were not adding up any more. I knew that I deserved to be loved everyday, not only with words but with actions. I found a great deal of power in learning about love. I had been confused this whole time as I believed what we were all taught to believe as children - that love was something you find inside of another person. This journey allowed me to heal, forgive and accelerate my life towards love. Our journeys have different titles but we are all out here walking together toward the same goal. People with different skin tones, speech variations and socie-economic status all deserve love. This is The Dear Queen Journey: A Path To Self Love.

    

    From Agard to Zephaniah, the very best of children's poetry from the very best of children's poets appears in this wonderful and exciting anthology edited by Michael Rosen, the Children's Laureate.Coinciding with his laureateship and a very welcome public promotion of the need for children's poetry in our education system, this future classic for Puffin will delight readers young and old, and make the perfect gift.

    These stories span characters and emotional states with canny details that touch the depths of your soul. Picturing the complexities of love, misery and mystery, the stories try to gnaw your heart like never before.• What does a flower teach us we often fail to see?• “The belly is an ungrateful wretch.” Is it true?• Ever wondered about the sparseness and illusions in life?• Does death put an end to true love?• Have all the ascetics won over their emotions?With the power of simple language, this book transports the readers to a world scarcely thought of in our bustling lives. The allegories maintain an intense rhythm of life prompting the readers to perceive things from a unique angle.“A whole bookful to make you think, cry, think again and move on.”

    She restores historic carousels -- her dream career -- working from her own studio in a former roller skating rink. Though black herself, she spent her first years in a Basque immigrant community in Nevada, the adopted child of a single mother. And after the mother's death, she was raised by her Aunt Joy in a Catholic Worker house.  Mirai has a lot going for her -- but then, why is everything suddenly falling apart? Her current, year-long carousel project is veering crazily out of control, in both schedule and budget. The guy who dumped her only months before has shown up married and -- as far as Mirai is concerned -- to the worst possible person. Her mother's death long ago is looking less and less like an accident. And Joy, the one person who has had her complete trust, may know more about that death than she has let Mirai believe.  Mirai knows how to restore a carousel, but can she restore relationships with those she loves? Can she strip the old paint of past wrongs to prepare her life for new, more vibrant colors? And will her eyes be clear enough to spot the brass ring when it finally comes within reach? ///////////////////////////////////////////////// Anne L. Watson, a retired historic preservation architecture consultant, is the author of several novels, plus books on such diverse subjects as soapmaking and baking with cookie molds. She currently lives in Friday Harbor, Washington, in the San Juan Islands, with her husband and fellow author, Aaron Shepard. ///////////////////////////////////////////////// SAMPLE Next morning, I picked out Will's car parked on the street in front of the coffee shop. No room for doubt -- Will had a real screamer of a car, an old red Mustang convertible. Not that he described it that way. His version started off with "1964-1/2" for the model year and "poppy red" for the color, then veered into details about the color of certain key engine parts -- at which point I had always zoned out so far, I didn't hear the rest of the speech. There it sat, parked at the curb in Peregrine Falls, Idaho, already collecting a few admirers. Not even counting the vanity plate -- ORGAN4U -- the car had so much of Will's personality attached to it, I felt mildly nauseated. As an alternative to kicking a fender, I slammed into the coffee shop. "Whoa, Mirai! Remember us?" The crew had gathered at the only big table in the Clearwater Cafe. I'd been so wrapped up in my own problems, I hadn't even seen them. They were all there -- Evangeline, Harvey, Mr. Papadakis. And Will. Neither fight nor flight was practical. I sat down at the table. The waitress hurried to me with a coffeepot and mug. I ordered the special and sipped my coffee. "Clearwater" was certainly the word for that coffee -- they must have named the restaurant after it. I glanced around the table, skipping over Will. Mr. Papadakis caught my eye. "What's the agenda?" he asked. "We'll go to the park as soon as we're done here. Check out the carousel, then have lunch with the committee. We have to give the owners a preliminary report tomorrow morning." Evangeline smiled. "How long are you staying?" she asked me. "All week. You?" "I'll stay awhile. I may want to work on things in place." In Evangeline's case, "awhile" could mean several months. She had an answering service, but no permanent address. At the moment, I envied her. Harvey shook his head. "I'm leaving tomorrow night. I'll come back later, when the work on the building starts. For now, a couple of days will do it." It was Will's turn, so I had to look toward him then. He sat quietly, holding a coffee cup. Will had never worn jewelry, but now a ring glinted on his finger. A plain gold ring on the fourth finger of his left hand. A wedding ring.

    With introductions by the translators." "Trakl is a supreme example of patience and bravery, and the worlds which these virtues enabled him to explore, and whose inhabitants he so faithfully describes, are places of great fullness and depth. His poems are not objects to be used and then cast aside, but entrances into places where deep, silent labors go on."

    From his earliest songs of the 1960s to his years with Island Records, these are the potent lyrics to the international reggae sound that was to make Bob Marley an unforgettable music legend.

    Former officer with the Los Angeles Police Department, certified dog lover and the lone employee of Sierra Bay Investigations. During the morning, Mia works in her sister’s flower and gift shop, Petals & Pearls. When Aunt Vivian arrives for the afternoon shift behind the cash register, Mia climbs the stairs to a small office in the same building to work on cases, drink endless cups of coffee and confer with a trustworthy Golden Retriever named Lulu. For Mia, returning to her charming seaside hometown after more than a decade is a fresh start in every way. She’s living in the cozy guest cottage behind her mother’s house. She’s having a great time reconnecting with childhood friends. And she lands her first client before the paint is dry on her office walls. But when the seemingly simple job becomes a homicide case, Mia agrees to work alongside Detective Luke Stewart from the Sierra Bay Police Department. The case propels Mia and Luke into an intricate whodunit involving a diamond evil eye pendant, local gossip and family scandals, anonymous threats delivered by email, a stolen flash drive filled with secrets, a blood-stained steak knife and a commemorative bottle of Lilac Mist, the signature fragrance from the grand opening of Petals & Pearls. Lilac Mist Murder is Book 1 in the Sierra Bay Mysteries, a new series from the author of Sky High Pies Cozy Mysteries.