Minding the Sun

With characteristic sensitivity and intelligence, Robert Pack reflects on man's relation to and responsibilities toward nature. Throughout, his verses are informed with an ecological vigilance born of his devotion to the New England landscape. The opening section marks a return for Pack to the musical sensuality of the lyric. These short lyrics are uniquely his: the sequence begins in Vermont and concludes in the Andromeda galaxy, providing an opportunity to hold in mind the nurturing sun of our solar system. The poems of the collection's middle section, written in the flowing narrative and meditative mode familiar to Pack's many admirers, take up the themes of human sexuality and consciousness. And the final section, replete with puns and paradoxes, shows Pack at his most playful as he muses on art, technology, romantic and marital desire, and the stubborn longing for transcendence. The poet concludes the volume with a sobering plea, "The Trees Will Die," to heed the sun's example, to cherish and protect our planet and all its living things. Robert Pack is the College Professor of Literature and Creative Writing at Middlebury College. He is the author of three critical works and over a dozen books of poetry, including Fathering the Map: New and Selected Later Poems (1993), also published by the University of Chicago Press.