A Word Like Fire: Selected Poems

By Dick Barnes

Book Overview

"Thank you, other twolegged bare featherless creature, for sharing the jagged horizon of my life.Thank you rainbow over the East Mojavelow to the ground so early in the afternoon: thank you for being... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1590511670
• ISBN13: 9781590511671
• Release Date: April 2005
• Publisher: Other Press
• Length: 168 Pages
• Weight: 0.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.2" x 0.4" x 5.2"

Customer Reviews

real poetry from a real poet

In the interest of full disclosure, I studied under Dick Barnes in college. I also hung out with him a bit. He didn't cultivate a professorial distance with his students; instead, he shared his insight, knowledge, and wit with us. He wasn't always conventional, but what he had to say usually stuck with you. Barnes was a good guy. More to the point, he was an indisputably gifted poet. This collection of verse is well worth your time if you are interested in a voice and perspective as rich and subtle as the southeastern California landscape in which much of Barnes's poetry is rooted. You don't need to have known him in order to appreciate his literary gifts, but I'll say that I'm glad that this collection exists to remind us who Dick Barnes was as a man and a poet.

Poet, Musician, Original

Like most poetry fans, I might easily have overlooked Dick Barnes' work, had he not been my college faculty advisor. Even still, it took time to realize the depth of talent contained in this enigmatic individual sitting across a desk from me, who was more commonly known around campus for turning up with a blues/jazz ensemble, brandishing handsful of fingerpicks and a washboard hung across his chest. Fortunately, copies of his poems were occasionally passed to me by shifty cohorts and colleagues, like gnostic documents to be read with appropriate awe. Rarely have words on a printed page so effectivley conveyed so rich a tone; this work doesn't merely invoke the sights and smells of the desert, but the lyrical quality of those people dear to it. I feel fortunate to've heard him recite some of his work aloud, and moreso now that I can read and remember it well. This is lasting verse by a great contributor to American language.