Risking Everything: 110 Poems of Love and Revelation

The topic of this anthology of poetry, "risking everything," is perfect for anyone needing or starting a new venture in life. These poems encourage us to throw open the doors and try again. What is not risky is the quality of the work. Some of the genre's most beloved and accomplished poets are represented: Mary Oliver, Rumi, Derek Walcott, Emily Dickinson, Rilke, Hafiz, and so many more. Well-done translations, too. Whether you attempt or only dream of change, the introductory chapter will set you up for whatever comes next in your life, and the poems will follow through with a one-two punch to your soul.

Already a fan of Frost, Cummings, Dickinson, Eliot, Kunitz, and Rilke, I began with James Wright: "Today I Was Happy, So I Made This Poem." Then I discovered, "We Shall Not Cease," by Eliot, the "Holy Spirit" by Hildegard and "Sunset" of Rilke! Quickly as carried back into that, never-never Land of youthful days, I settled into early favorites of Robert Frost and ee Cummings! In addition to these favorites by Wright, Eliot, Hildegard, Rilke, I have come to a renewed reverence for Goethe, Wordsworth and Robert Bly! Back to days spent singing with Robert Shaw and Frostiana Pieces like, "The Road Not Taken and "I Thank You God for this amazing day." These stand alongside the 99 year-old Stanley Kunitz, "The Long Boat!" FROM one who tends toward nostalgia, Retired Chaplain, Fred W Hood, "barbara377" (Fayetteville Georgia United States)

Writer and editor Roger Housden's luminous and inspirational compilation of poetry "Risking Everything: 110 Poems of Love and Revelation," is one of the best anthologies of this type I have read or seen. This is Housden's fourth volume of a series that began with "Ten Poems To Change Your Life." In "Risking Everything: 110 Poems of Love and Revelation," Housden selected 110 poems from around the world, whose poets' lives and works span the centuries. I frequently open the book at random and never fail to be moved. Housden has written: "Great poetry happens when the mind is looking the other way and words fall from the sky to shape a moment that would normally be untranslatable." Carl Sandburg wrote: "Poetry is the journal of the sea animal living on land, wanting to fly in the air. Poetry is a search for syllables to shoot at the barriers of the unknown and the unknowable. Poetry is a phantom script telling how rainbows are made and why they go away." And from Emily Dickenson: "To see the Summer Sky / Is Poetry though never in a Book it lie / True Poems flee." Whatever poetry is, some of the best can be found here. Included in this volume are: "Poetry" by Pablo Neruda, "On Angels" "Eyes" by Czeslaw Milosz, "Today Like Every Other Day" by Rumi, "That Day" by Denise Levertov, "Milkweed" by James Wright, "My Fiftieth Year" by W. B. Yeats, "Sunset," and "The Swan" by Ranier Marie Rilke, "The Wind One Brilliant Day" by Antonio Machado, "Everything Is Plundered" by Anna Akhmatova, "Lines Composed A Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey" (excerpt) by William Wordsworth, "A Homecoming" by Wendell Berry, "The Third Body" by Robert Bly, "To have without holding" by Marge Piercy, "Deeper Than Love" by D. H. Lawrence, "The Peace of Wild Things" by Wendell Berry," "Soul At The White Heat" and "Wild Nights" by Emily Dickenson, "I Thank You" by E.E. Cummings, "Postscript" by Seamus Heaney, "The Road Not Taken" Robert Frost. Roger Housdan is the author of numerous books on cultural and spiritual themes, including the bestselling Ten Poems series. JANA

A few days ago I picked up a copy of Roger Housden's anthology Risking Everything: 110 Poems of Love and Revelation. Today I opened it at a random page, and suddenly felt compelled to start reading the poem out loud. It was D. H. Lawrence's Deeper Than Love, and I found myself reading it slowly, lingering over the words, tasting them, feeling their weight on my tongue. Love, like the flowers, is life, growing. But underneath are the deep rocks, the living rock that lives alone and deeper still the unknown fire, unknown and heavy, heavy and alone. The noise of the air conditioner in the kitchen drowned my speech (it's a miserable night, dew point around 75, no central air) which was good: I was only reading for myself. I finished the Lawrence, and opened again at random: Billy Collins' This Much I Do Remember. Not a poem to read out loud, this one, but one to close your eyes and see what the poet had seen: that I could feel it being painted within me brushed on the wall of my skull And of course all of Housden's favourites are here, like old familiar friends: Rumi, Bly, and above all Mary Oliver. What a glorious collection.

"Suffering is part of how it is on earth," editor Roger Housden observes in his Introduction to this luminous collection of poems; "it is an inherent part of the fabric of existence. And if we are lucky, it will break our hearts open" (p. xiii). Housden (TEN POEMS TO CHANGE YOUR LIFE; TEN POEMS TO OPEN YOUR HEART) knows great poetry. He has drawn the 110 poems collected in this anthology from around the world, and from every era of history. When read together, "they represent a great song of what is possible for us--all the ways in which a life can be fully lived" (p. xv). These poems reveal that if we risk stepping out of the familiar lamentations and the humdrum details of our daily existence, we might just discover "the White Heat" of our soul. "Listen," Mary Oliver challenges us, "are you breathing just a little, and calling it a life?"Other poets collected in this outstanding anthology of accessible poetry include America's Poet Laureate, Billy Collins, Nobel Prize winner, Czeslaw Milosz, Pablo Neruda, T. S. Eliot, Robert Bly, Rumi, Jane Hirshfield, W. B. Yeats, Galway Kinnell, Wendell Berry, Emily Dickinson, Kabir, Robert Frost, Denise Levertov, and William Stafford.G. Merritt