Waverly Songs

About the Book

The poems of Waverly Songs are simple, sensuous, passionate. They will instruct, delight, and move your heart to their rhythms. Experience and see the world from the perspective of this humorous, human poet: People are more precious, all creatures on earth have that special radiance, as do angels and God’s spiritual beings everywhere. Read the poems aloud, or to your silent ears, to hear and feel the resonance of your heart. You will be delighted, instructed, moved.

About the Author

Robert Sonkowsky is a poet and former actor married to Barbara Sonkowsky. They have three sons and five grandchildren. He has written poems since the second grade when his teacher, Miss Malarkey, his first love, used to ask her pupils to write poems and stories from the words in the spelling-lists and read them aloud before the class. He is also Professor Emeritus of Classics and Theater, U. of Minnesota. After attending grade school, junior and senior high school, as well as Lawrence College, all in Appleton, Wisconsin, he went on to his doctorate at the U. of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, 1958, with a year of the work at the U. of Rome, Italy. He had teaching and research positions in Classics and Theater at the Universities of Texas, Wisconsin, and Missouri before moving to the U. of Minnesota, where he was from 1962 to 2009, with interim appointments at Macalester College and the U. of Colorado. At Minnesota his academic books and articles were focused on Classical Greek and Latin language and literature as well as Chronobiology.

During those years he wrote many poems but published only a few. Since retiring he has published in on-line and print magazines and has produced one chap book, Unsound Science. The present volume, Waverly Songs, is based on the inspiring staff members and residents of Waverly Gardens, a beautiful retirement village, replete with wonderful flora, fauna, fountains, in North Oaks, Minnesota. Some of these are mentioned explicitly in the poems. Occasionally evoking memories earlier than Waverly Gardens, together they form the bedrock of the book. He recites his poetry in the North Oaks Poets and Writers Group almost weekly.