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Title: Picnic, Lightning (Pitt Poetry Series (Paper)) by Billy Collins ISBN: 0-8229-5670-5 Publisher: Univ of Pittsburgh Pr Pub. Date: March, 1998 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $12.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.03 (40 reviews)
Rating: 4
Summary: good
Comment: I don't know what else to say about Billy Collins that I haven't said elsewhere. He's a remarkable poet, who does his thing and does it well. Picnic, Lightning is a pretty solid collection of poems, though if you have Collins's selected poems there's no need to pick this one up. Those that weren't included in the selected aren't very good, with the exception of "I Go Back to the House For a Book," which I think is a marvelous poem and should have been included in the selected poems.
Rating: 4
Summary: A Study in Being
Comment: "I like writing about where I am,
where I happen to be sitting,
The humidity or the clouds,
The scene outside the window-
A pink tree in bloom,
A neighbor walking his small, nervous dog."
Billy Collins seems to have moments of brilliance within poems discussing ordinary aspects of everyday living. Is this part of his charm? I think for someone to find beauty in the ordinary, you have to have a vivid imagination and transform the simple into the magnificent.
Collins was reappointed to the post of U.S. Poet Laureate in the summer of 2002. He travels throughout the country for readings, lectures and is well loved by his audiences.
While some reviewers don't feel his poetry has beauty, I think the beauty is when you connect with a specific poem. In this book, I had to read all the way to page 39 before anything really "struck" me as amazing. There is a cute poem about breakfast, a story of fishing and then on page 17 I found: "no matter what the size the aquarium of one's learning, another colored pebble can always be dropped in."
I think what I like is the conversational style. Billy seems to mostly be talking to the reader or explaining a situation that he enjoyed. There is a casual elegance in his poems. He invites you to journey with him through the poems, although at times Collins throws in a highly imaginative sentence or an entire poem that throws you for an intellectual loop. Billy Collins vocabulary is stunning all on its own. The way he blends the words into images and colors is more than impressive.
In "Journal" you can imagine yourself walking in the dark, downstairs in a robe and trying to compose an entry in a journal. Any writer knows, you can hardly go to sleep when thoughts are pouring out of your mind and begging to be dripped through a pen onto a new page.
My favorite poem in this book was: "I Go Back to the House for a Book" because anyone who loves reading can relate to being stranded without a book. Here one part of himself goes back to the house while another part races off into the world. He plays with a similar idea in "The Night House," where his body, heart, mind and soul go to different areas of the house.
"Moon" is rather interesting. Here, Collins speaks of our inner child and how even if we don't have a child, we can care for our inner child. I have to laugh when I read "Paradelle for Susan," because even the poem sounds nervous. Collins repeats most of the lines. Apparently a Paradelle is not that easy to write and it might be a fun challenge to try to write your own poem in this "fixed form."
Reading the poems in "Picnic, Lightning" might make you feel slightly poetic yourself.
Pittsburgh Press has issued special limited edition hardcovers of three of Billy Collins' books: Questions about Angels, The Art of Drowning, and Picnic, Lightning. I'm thinking I need to find an autographed copy of "Questions about Angels." If you are just starting to read poems by Billy Collins, I'd start with "Questions about Angels."
Rating: 5
Summary: Light-lit Vignettes
Comment: Billy Collins fulfills Wordsworth's image of "spots of time" captured and later reflected upon. Though Collins's messages and meanings are subtler than Wordsworth's, Collins connects with feelings and moments common to many of us. His inspiration from daily life, from which he draws Keillor-esque observations, quenched my fears that as a writer, I must draw from exotic experiences uncommon to my readers. A peaceful read at Saturday breakfast.
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Title: The Art of Drowning (Pitt Poetry Series (Paper)) by Billy Collins ISBN: 0822955679 Publisher: Univ of Pittsburgh Pr (Trd) Pub. Date: July, 1995 List Price(USD): $12.95 |
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Title: Questions About Angels (Pitt Poetry Series) by Billy Collins ISBN: 0822956985 Publisher: Univ of Pittsburgh Pr (Trd) Pub. Date: March, 1999 List Price(USD): $12.95 |
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Title: Sailing Alone Around the Room : New and Selected Poems by Billy Collins ISBN: 0375755195 Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks Pub. Date: 17 September, 2002 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
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Title: Nine Horses : Poems by Billy Collins ISBN: 0375755209 Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks Pub. Date: 14 October, 2003 List Price(USD): $12.95 |
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Title: The Apple That Astonished Paris: Poems by Billy Collins by Billy Collins ISBN: 155728024X Publisher: Univ of Arkansas Pr Pub. Date: September, 1988 List Price(USD): $16.00 |
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