Picnic, Lightning

by Billy Collins

Overview

Winner of the 1999 Paterson Poetry Prize

Over the past decade, Billy Collins has emerged as the most beloved American poet since Robert Frost, garnering critical acclaim and broad popular appeal. Annie Proulx admits, "I have never before felt possessive about a poet, but I am fiercely glad that Billy Collins is ours." John Updike proclaims his poems "consistently startling, more serious than they seem, they describe all the worlds that are and were and some others besides."

This special, limited edition celebrates Billy Collins's years as U.S. Poet Laureate. Picnic, Lightning—one of the books that helped establish and secure his reputation and popularity during the 1990s—combines humor and seriousness, wit and sublimity. His poems touch on a wide range of subjects, from jazz to death, from weather to sex, but share common ground where the mind and heart can meet. Whether reading him for the first time or the fiftieth, this collector's edition is a must-have for anyone interested in the poet the New York Times calls simply "the real thing."

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780822956709
Publisher:	University of Pittsburgh Press
Publication date:	01/29/1998
Series:	Pitt Poetry Series
Edition description:	1
Pages:	104
Sales rank:	266,967
Product dimensions:	6.12(w) x 8.00(h) x 0.40(d)

About the Author

Billy Collins, named U.S. Poet Laureate in June 2001 and reappointed to the post in 2002, has published many collections of poetry, including  The Apple That Astonished Paris; Nine Horses; The Art of Drowning; Picnic, Lightning; Questions about Angels; and Sailing Alone Around the Room. A professor of English at Lehman College of the City University of New York, he lives in Somers, New York.

Hometown:

Somers, New York

Date of Birth:

March 22, 1941

Place of Birth:

New York, New York

Education:

B.A., Holy Cross College, 1963; Ph.D. in Romantic poetry, University of California at Riverside, 1971

Table of Contents

	A Portrait of the Reader with a Bowl of Cereal	3
I
	Fishing on the Susquehanna in July	7
	To a Stranger Born in Some Distant Country Hundreds of Years from Now	9
	I Chop Some Parsley While Listening to Art Blakey's Version of "Three Blind Mice"	10
	Afternoon with Irish Cows	12
	Marginalia	14
	What I Learned Today	17
	Journal	20
	Some Days	22
	Silence	23
	Picnic, Lightning	24
II
	In the Room of a Thousand Miles	29
	Morning	31
	Bonsai	32
	Splitting Wood	34
	Shoveling Snow with Buddha	37
	I Go Back to the House for a Book	39
	After the Storm	41
	Snow	44
	Moon	46
	Looking West	48
	The Much I Do Remember	49
	Japan	51
III
	Victoria's Secret	55
	Musee des Beaux Art Revisited	59
	Lines Composed Over Three Thousand Miles from Tintern Abbey	61
	Paradelle for Susan	64
	Duck/Rabbit	65
	Egypt	66
	Home Again	68
	Lines Lost Among Trees	70
	The Many Faces of Jazz	72
	Taking Off Emily Dickinson's Clothes	74
IV
	The Night House	79
	The Death of the Hat	81
	The List of Ancient Pastimes	83
	Passengers	85
	Serpentine	87
	Reincarnation and You	89
	Jazz and Nature	91
	And His Sextet	94
	Where I Live	96
	My Life	98
	Aristotle	100
	Acknowledgments	103

What People are Saying About This

John Updike

Billy Collins writes lovely poems -- lovely in a way almost nobody's since Roethke's are.

Editorial Reviews

Billy Collins writes lovely poems—lovely in a way almost nobody’s since Roethke’s are. Limpid, gently and consistently startling, more serious than they seem, they describe all the worlds that are and were and some others besides.”
—John Updike

“The easy swing of Collins's lines reflect his love of jazz and his ready response to beauty; the warmth of his voice emanates from his instinct for pleasure and his propensity toward humor. . . . Collins is jazzman and Buddhist, charmer and prince.”
—Booklist

“Billy Collins writes a kind of poetry that is . . . graceful, inviting, generous-hearted, able to treat engagingly of life’s pleasures as well as its pain. . . . entering a poem by Mr. Collins is like entering a comfortable yet beautifully appointed guet room; for the time being, it will give you all that you need.”

—The Washington Times

“These are wonderful poems and he’s one of our best poets.”

—American Poet

 “Billy Collins's poetry is heartbreakingly beautiful. It is also wise, funny, and brilliant. My ten favorites keep shifting all the time. Ovid is in again; so is Billy Collins.”

—Gerald Stern

“Billy Collins, America's poet laureate, 'hits you between the eyes' with his 'twisted' take on everyday life.”

—U.S. News & World Report

“I have never before felt possessive about a poet, but I am fiercely glad that Billy Collins is ours—smart, his strings tuned and resonant, his wonderful eye looping over the things, events and ideas of the world, rueful, playful, warm-voiced, easy to love.”
—E. Annie Proulx

From the Publisher