BOOK: “A Poetry Handbook” by Mary Oliver

Posted on September 29, 2026 by B Gourley

A Poetry Handbook: A Prose Guide to Understanding and Writing Poetry by Mary Oliver
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Publisher site — Ecco

This is an excellent soup-to-nuts primer on poetry writing. While it would be a great tool for someone just beginning their poetic journey — i.e. one who didn’t yet know iambic pentameter from trochaic tetrameter — it also offers some nuggets of wisdom for one who is farther down the road. Mary Oliver had some unique ways of thinking about, or expressing thoughts about, the art.

The book does cover ideas relevant to both modern and traditional poetry. In this regard it has an advantage over, say, Stephen Fry’s The Ode Less Traveled in that Oliver considered both free and metered verse to be poetry.

The author uses the occasional poem or fragment from a variety of poets to make her points but doesn’t get bogged down in examples or analysis of poems.

Among the discussions that seemed better or more insightful than those in other such books were reflections upon the role of imitative exercises as well as exploration of the value of workshops and feedback.

I’d highly recommend this book for poets and serious poetry readers.

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Slaughter-bot [Free Verse]

Posted on September 24, 2026 by B Gourley

Image generated by CoPilot from the prompt: "Draw me a Kung Fu Robot." — Image by Microsoft Copilot (AI)

Clumsy Kung Fu robots
   will become slaughter-bots
      in our time.

What they lack in Zen spontaneity 
   and warrior ethos they will make 
      up for in speed, power, and
          dense metal alloy.

Replaced limbs will make them more
   -- not less -- capable fighters.

Will a battling robot ever wonder
    How did we get here?
                   or
    What is the point?

Or will it only wonder why it is
    using its feet as impact weapons
         when it has ray-guns?

(It is a little like building a typing pool
    of robots... only way, way cooler.)

BOOK REVIEW: “Scattered Poems” by Jack Kerouac

Posted on August 4, 2026 by B Gourley

Scattered Poems by Jack Kerouac
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Publisher Site – Open Road Media

Kerouac is best known as a novelist, particularly as the author of the groundbreaking Beat work, On the Road, but he did publish one poetry collection during his lifetime, Mexico City Blues. This book, Scattered Poems, was the first of a glut of posthumously released poetry collections. With posthumously released editions, one usually has to wonder how close the book is to the poet’s ideal, given the author’s lack of input into the final product but — given Kerouac’s penchant for spontaneous composition and airing pieces as they fell from the mind — it’s probable these poems wouldn’t have been highly edited. (Note: A number of the pieces were previously published, but many were obtained from private correspondence — notably letters to Allen Ginsberg.)

The poems are mostly free verse, and the rhyming verse (e.g. “Pull My Daisy”) is usually short line or doggerel lines falling into longer poems. The poems deal in both Kerouac’s birth religion, Christianity, and Buddhism, a philosophy which had a major influence on his thinking throughout his adult life. Some have a Zen quality that makes it hard to determine whether they are nonsense or a conduit from satori (or both.) To enjoy these poems, one must have a love of spontaneity. Readers expecting a polished collection may be displeased but will certainly have missed Kerouac’s philosophy of writing which strove to emulate the improvisation of Jazz.

I enjoyed this collection, and I think the publisher did a good job of showing the arrangement of the poems as written. I’d highly recommend this work for poetry readers who enjoy stream of consciousness experimental poetry or anyone interested in the work of the Beats.

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