Lion Sun: Poems by Pavel Chichikov

By Pavel Chichikov

"Lion Sun" contains more than 70 poems by a poet who was received into the Catholic Church in 1988 and who derives much of his inspiration from the natural world. His poetry takes the reader to... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 096719010X
• ISBN13: 9780967190105
• Release Date: August 1999
• Publisher: Grey Owl Pr
• Length: 90 Pages
• Weight: 0.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.0" x 0.5" x 6.3"

Customer Reviews

Only seen by poets and saints

Thornton Wilder says, in Our Town, something like this: there are some things "seen only by poets and saints." Read this beautiful book of poems and I think you will know what Wilder means! This is a book both poetic and saintly, a book of vision. Pavel's crafted and gifted words opens eyes and opens hearts. A good, good book.

A Deeply Personal Spirtual Landscape.

Pavel's work is lyrical and intensely personal. There are observations of the physical world included in the verse [including a delightful response to the goldfinch in " The Small Musician"] but most of the poems are spiritual landscapes - poems that speak of a lively mind's encounters with guilt, grace, God, the World, the Flesh and the Devil. Observations of nature are essentially the beginnings of a spiritual insight so that a toad, a dragonfly, birdsong or storm becomes emblematic of a spiritual life that transcends the physical. In this sense, his work owes much to the nineteenth century Romantics; the same sense of the poet alone in the natural world characteristic of Wordsworth or Gerard Manly Hopkins pervades the poetry of Lion Sun.Using simple verse forms, Chichikov brings a visionary style to the work. The poet's own voice is a constant feature of the verse. Many poems begin with and specificity the poet conveys. The weakness, perhaps, is that the poet may become baffling in the allusions spun. One sometimes leaves a poem curiously unsatisfied that the power of the message is lost when a crucial element is missed by the reader. There are few contexts in which to fix the poems. The works are largely undated and there is no introduction or biographical information in which to fix the work. Where the poems work well without contexts, they are powerful and winsome.The spiritual landscapes drawn in the verse are often on the largest canvas. Saints and sinners, giants and angels, creation and redemption figure in the poems. Political features only intrude into the landscapes for their spiritual interest as in the sonnet The Voice. Chichikov is at his best when he is most tender and personal, when the biggest allegories give way to the fine observation and instress, as Hopkins would have it. My favourite poem in the anthology is called Creation - a sonnet written for his wife Nancy. Like the person to whom it is dedicated, the poem is gentle, subtle and intelligentThe book is stunning in its design with an exquisite typeface and display. The illustrations by Eric Young are lively and attractive. This is a book that will puzzle, charm and inspire and deserves a wider readership than poetry usually commands

Magnificent work from a magnificent poet

A brilliant collection of poetry from one of our greatest poets. I can't recommend it highly enough.

Pavel Chichikov's _Lion Sun_ is a gift of faith.

Pavel Chichikov is an inspired writer whose poems in _Lion Sun_ are an invitation to a walk in the natural/cerebral forest, and along the path one may find one's feet slipping down a crevice into a deep river of meaning, sliding into galaxies of timelessness and space, dimensions of darkness and light. His are not poems for the superficially religious or faint of heart. Pavel weaves words of steel and feather into fish hooks to lure those hungry in spirit for a Christian faith with substance, truth, and nourishment. Pavel Chichikov is a master of sensitivity and beauty, as well as terror and fierceness, and we, his readers, are privileged to have his work in print to challenge and uplift us. Because he is a brilliant, prolific writer, inspired by the Spirit which awakened his own faith in Jesus Christ, and obedient to the call to share his work at this time, it is my hope that _Lion Sun_ will gain wide recognition and is the first of many of his books to come. The book is beautiful in composition and presentation, enhanced by the powerful artwork of Eric Young. I recommend _Lion Sun_whole-heartedly.

Profound images, stirring the creative imagination

I really like the way Pavel writes. I find it very easy to sort of step into the "story" that unfolds. The images are rich and profound, inexhaustible, engaging the creative imagination. The more I read, the more I find. There's something that touches the deeper experiences of life and underscores our sacred connection to this beautiful earth, of whose dust we are made, enlivened by the breath of God. That's important to me, that connection.