Writing Letters for the Blind

Front Cover
Ohio State University Press, 2003 - Poetry - 82 pages

These poems begin in the coming-of-age moments that change us by forcing recognition of physical weakness, the power of sex, the importance of family, the presence of evil, and the prevalence of mortality. The book opens with narratives taken primarily from childhood and then, divided by long poem sequences, moves to adulthood and confrontation with the identity we acquire through close relationships and the pressures of our appetites, finally ending with what reads as a universal prayer of redemption.

Writing Letters for the Blind presents the reader with visions of this world and all its beauty and sordidness, joy and disappointment. This poet reports the breaking news just in from the heart and soul, and the body as well. "My father has taught me the beatitudes of sight," Fincke tells us, always aware of what we owe to those who brought us here. He stays up through the starry darkness in the insomnia of one who feels it his duty to pay passionate attention, a poet engaged in "the basic defense of simple things."

 

Selected pages

Contents

333
31
The Sin Diseases
39
The Leukemia Student
45
Miss Hutchings Takes the Girls in Our Health Class Aside for the Lesson
61
The Piecework of Writing
67
A Prayer
70
Copyright

Other editions - View all

Writing Letters for the Blind
Gary Fincke
Snippet view - 2003
Writing Letters for the Blind
Gary Fincke
No preview available - 2020

Common terms and phrases

Beatitudes of Sight Bill Dudley Bill Nelson BILLION HEARTBEATS Billy Conn BLACK THREAD blind blood Blue Moon Braillettes breath child Chubby Checker color CURES death desk doctor dogs dough Elvis eyes face father fear floor hand head heard Heart Warming Records Herpin horns How's It Going hundred inside keep knew learned Lennon Sisters letters light listening Look marbled meat memorize minute Miss Hartung mother neighbor never night nineteen sixty-three once OPTOMETRIST passes all understanding Patience and Prudence Paula Phelan peeled fruit piecework Plagues in Order POINTILLISM pull PUSHING THE BLACK Radithor rainbow record remember repeating Running Through Directions says screamed shirt skull slap sleep slept smart boy smiling Someone song Southern Review stare story There's things thought thousand three upstairs rooms told turn Twenty Vari-Vue waiting walked wanted watch wife woman women words wore writing wrote yearbook

About the author (2003)

Gary Fincke is professor of English and director of the Writers' Institute at Susquehanna University.

Bibliographic information

TitleWriting Letters for the Blind
Osu Journal Award Poetry Series
AuthorGary Fincke
PublisherOhio State University Press, 2003
ISBN0814209505, 9780814209509
Length82 pages
Subjects ›  › 

Poetry / American / General
Poetry / General
  
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