The Wonder of Small Things: Poems of Peace and Renewal

(Paperback)

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Description

James Crews, editor of two best-selling poetry anthologies, How to Love the World and The Path to Kindness, presents an all-new collection of highly accessible poems on the theme of celebrating moments of wonder and peace in everyday life. As Crews writes in the introduction: "[A] deep love for the world is present in every one of the poems gathered in this book. Wonder calls us back to the curiosity we are each born with, and it makes us want to move closer to what sparks our attention. Wonder opens our senses and helps us stay in touch with a humbling sense of our own human smallness in the face of unexpected beauty and the delicious mysteries of life on this planet."

The anthology features a foreword by Nikita Gill and a carefully curated selection of poems from a diverse range of authors, including Native American poets Joy Harjo, Linda Hogan, Kimberly Blaeser, and Joseph Bruchac, and BIPOC writers Ross Gay, Julia Alvarez, and Toi Derricotte. Crews features new poems from popular writers such as Natalie Goldberg, Mark Nepo, Ted Kooser, Naomi Shihab Nye, Jane Hirshfield, and Jacqueline Suskin, along with selections from emerging poets. Readers are guided in exploring the meaning and essence of the poems through a series of reflective pauses scattered through the pages and reading group questions in the back. This anthology offers the perfect intersection for the growing number of readers interested in mindful living and bringing poetry into their everyday lives.

Reviews

"Reading these hand-selected poems of wonder and awe is like being handed a bowl of ripe, sweet fruits--so enjoyable, so surprisingly different, so deeply nourishing."--Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer, author of All the Honey and Hush

Author Bio

James Crews is the editor of the best-selling anthologies, The Path to Kindness and How to Love the World, which has been featured on NPR's Morning Edition, in the Boston Globe, and the Washington Post. His poems have appeared in the New York Times Magazine, Ploughshares, The New Republic, and The Christian Century. He collaborated with former US poet laureate Ted Kooser on "American Life in Poetry," which reaches millions of readers across the world.

Crews holds an MFA in creative writing from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a PhD in writing and literature from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. He teaches poetry at the University at Albany and lives with his husband in Shaftsbury, Vermont.