The Scent of Water: New & Selected Poems - Softcover

Ivy Dempsey

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1888809264 ISBN 13: 9781888809268

Publisher: La Alameda Press, 2001

Synopsis

The Scent of Water maps a pilgrimage from a child's puzzled awakening, through the shock of adult despairs, toward the humbling wisdom of acceptance. How does meaning happen in our immediate experience? And what role must a basic sense of reverence play as we parse our world? Throughout the poems, these questions underlie the vital impact of specific landscapes of trees, skies, and waters in Oklahoma, Kansas, California, and New Mexico. In trees, especially, Dempsey finds a symbol for our belonging both to the heart of earth and body of the heavens in a mysterious universe that welcomes biblical as well as scientific interpretations. Bringing the reader to both root and light, The Scent of Water proposes that the way we live and die can be transformed when we understand that one energy sustains all our minds, bodies, each burning star.

About this title

About the Author

Educated at the University of Tulsa (A.M., Ph.D.), Ivy Dempsey has taught at California State University, Los Angeles and UCLA, and is now an associate poetry editor for Nimrod. Her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Poetry Prize. She lives in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

From the Back Cover

Winner of the 2002 Oklahoma Book Award for Poetry

Edition details

• Publisher: La Alameda Press
• Publication date: 2001
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1888809264
• ISBN 13: 9781888809268
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 128