Seventy-Two Labors - Softcover

Efird, Susan Kōdō

Softcover

ISBN 13: 9798985562170

Publisher: Antrim House, 2022

Synopsis

Seventy-Two Labors, a metaphor for the interconnection of all lives, sentient and insentient, could easily be titled Seventy-Two Astonishments. Poet and Zen teacher Susan KōDō Efird marshals the ordinary and extraordinary elements of our lives to send her readers in ever-expanding, ever-deepening directions. The book's three sections deliver imagination and compassion unbounded: a long poem about a radiant pot "awake on the stove;" short lyric poems in Song Cycles; and a final poem about a morning walk around her neighborhood and the Milky Way that carries us home. Humor and gratitude, shattered innocence, and reverence infuse the whole.

About this title

About the Author

Susan Lynn KōDō Efird, Sensei, is from Winston-Salem, North Carolina. She is the author of the book-length poem The Eye of Heaven with wood engravings by Michael McCurdy (Harry Duncan, Abattoir Editions) and shorter poems that appeared in Poetry, Southern Poetry Review, Verve, JAMA, A Garland for Harry Duncan, and other publications. Her lifelong immersion in literature and service began with an entry-level position at The New Yorker. She has worked as a volunteer for hospice, AIDS, and Alzheimer's patients, with prisoners through Lifelines to Solitary, as well as serving as aide to bird keepers at the National Zoo. For many years before her retirement, she was senior writer-editor at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. She is the founder and guiding teacher of Sky Above Great Wind, and a member of the White Plum Asanga. She lives in Washington, D.C.

Edition details

• Publisher: Antrim House
• Publication date: 2022
• Language: English
• ISBN 13: 9798985562170
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 78