By Joe Survant
The Stone
“The Stone: New and Selected Poems from Asia, is another gift from Joe Survant’s treasury. “The Jungle Letter To My Wife” begins colloquially enough – “There was something I wanted to say,”. In the next stanza, a “strangler fig” appears (like Chekhov’s Act I pistol) / whose slow aerial life / brings down the greatest tree.” The pistol shot arrives 3 lines later: “the terrible secret / hummed unheard / within you, a seed / some wayward bird / dropped carelessly / in the warm bark high / up your body’s tree.” Survant’s effortless, skillful joinery in this poem previews what’s evident in every poem. No jungle splendor exists without terrors. Risk is the price of rapture. Survant reveals the journey, laid (like Snyder’s Rip Rap), word by word, guiding us towards deep feeling and wisdom. I urge you to read this book.” – Peter Coyote, author, actor, Zen Buddhist Priest.
Kentucky poet laureate 2002-2004
Joe Survant
is the author of seven collections of poems. He is the winner of the Miller Williams poetry prize from the University of Arkansas Press for Anne & Alpheus, 1842-1882, the first book in his Kentucky trilogy. He is also the recipient of grants from the Kentucky Arts Council, the Kentucky Humanities Council, The Asia Foundation, The Fulbright Foundation, and the NEH. Individual poems have been published in Malaysia, China, Singapore, Japan, and the U.K., as well as widely in the U.S.
Other Books
View From the Stork Building:
Chinese Variations
Larkspur Press
“These English “variations” are very different from the Chinese originals, but they retain the insight and strong imagery of Classical Chinese poetry. The picture generated in the mind has a similar beauty and grace.” – Tian Xiaolin
The Land We Dreamed: Poems
University Press of Kentucky
“The poems in The Land We Dreamed are visions of a place, Kentucky, through deep time, all those years of beauty and blood. They give us not just how it was, but how it felt. They’re a true gift.” – Kim Stanley Robinson, author of Red Mars, Hugo and Nebula Award winner.
Rafting Rise
University Press of Florida
“Rafting Rise is a terrific book, the richly detailed evocation of an entire world, and an important contribution to the literature of the rural South.” – Ted Kooser, author of Delights & Shadows, former U.S. Poet Laureate and winner of the Pulitzer Prize.
Anne & Alpheus 1842-1882
University of Arkansas Press
( Arkansas Poetry Prize)
“Anne & Alpheus is a triumphant look at life one hundred years ago, yes, but it is also a hymn to what is best and lasting in the human spirit.” – Lola Haskins, author of Hunger, winner of the Iowa Poetry Prize.
Contact Joe
joe.survant@wku.edu