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Satori
Satori, this book that took my entire life to put together, is the closest I can come to an answer. I see the whole book and every poem in it as the working out of the endless possibilities of the line. In the end, I came back to the Imagists--Pound, H.D., Amy Lowell, Jack Moodey who taught me that the essence of the poetic line is the image, not the metaphor, which decodes into a system of signs, but the hard, clear, limpid image, the incontrovertible image. Without the image, the poetic line is hollow. But the goal of our art from the cave paintings at Chauvet to the '80s movie Blade Runner and on down has been to make art move.
- GenresPoetry
Paperback
First published April 22, 2014
1 person is currently reading
4 people want to read
About the author
Jack Remick
48 books43 followersAn accomplished novelist and poet, this author’s body of work explores the complexities of identity, isolation, moral conflict, and the human condition across shifting cultural and psychological landscapes. Blending literary depth with philosophical undertones, their writing spans novels, poetry, and collaborative works, often marked by introspection, existential tension, and bold narrative structure.
BOOKS
Valley Boy (Second Edition)
A defining work that captures themes of dislocation, personal struggle, and the search for meaning, set against a vividly rendered backdrop.
No Century for Apologies
A critically recognized novel shortlisted for the prestigious Hoffer Grand Prize (2023), examining the weight of history, memory, and consequence.
Citadel (A Novel)
A compelling narrative that navigates power, confinement, and the structures, both internal and external, that shape human lives.
Blood
A stark and evocative work that confronts primal instincts, violence, and emotional fracture.
The California Quartet
A sweeping four-part literary series mapping psychological and cultural terrain through interconnected narratives:
The Deification — Book One
Valley Boy — Book Two (First Edition)
The Book of Changes — Book Three
Trio of Lost Souls — Book Four
Gabriela and the Widow
An award-winning novel celebrated for its emotional depth and exploration of womanhood and resilience. Recipient of Best Women’s Fiction at the Orangeberry Virtual Book Expo; Montaigne Medal Finalist; Book of the Year Award Finalist.
COLLABORATIVE WORK
The Weekend Novelist Writes a Mystery (co-authored with Robert J. Ray)
A practical and insightful guide for aspiring writers, combining craft expertise with accessible instruction on constructing compelling mystery narratives.
POETRY
Satori: Poems
A contemplative collection reflecting moments of clarity, awakening, and inner transformation.
Songs of Sadness, Joy and Despair for the Anthropocene
A powerful and unflinching poetic work blending long-form verse and the sequence Josie Delgado, capturing the emotional and existential weight of modern existence.
ADDITIONAL FICTION
Doubles in a Game of Chance
A surreal and haunting novel centered on a bureaucratic nightmare, following a disoriented protagonist trapped in an absurd, relentless system.
Man Alone: The Dark Book
A deeply introspective and shadowed narrative examining solitude, identity, and the darker edges of the human psyche.
BOOKS
Valley Boy (Second Edition)
A defining work that captures themes of dislocation, personal struggle, and the search for meaning, set against a vividly rendered backdrop.
No Century for Apologies
A critically recognized novel shortlisted for the prestigious Hoffer Grand Prize (2023), examining the weight of history, memory, and consequence.
Citadel (A Novel)
A compelling narrative that navigates power, confinement, and the structures, both internal and external, that shape human lives.
Blood
A stark and evocative work that confronts primal instincts, violence, and emotional fracture.
The California Quartet
A sweeping four-part literary series mapping psychological and cultural terrain through interconnected narratives:
The Deification — Book One
Valley Boy — Book Two (First Edition)
The Book of Changes — Book Three
Trio of Lost Souls — Book Four
Gabriela and the Widow
An award-winning novel celebrated for its emotional depth and exploration of womanhood and resilience. Recipient of Best Women’s Fiction at the Orangeberry Virtual Book Expo; Montaigne Medal Finalist; Book of the Year Award Finalist.
COLLABORATIVE WORK
The Weekend Novelist Writes a Mystery (co-authored with Robert J. Ray)
A practical and insightful guide for aspiring writers, combining craft expertise with accessible instruction on constructing compelling mystery narratives.
POETRY
Satori: Poems
A contemplative collection reflecting moments of clarity, awakening, and inner transformation.
Songs of Sadness, Joy and Despair for the Anthropocene
A powerful and unflinching poetic work blending long-form verse and the sequence Josie Delgado, capturing the emotional and existential weight of modern existence.
ADDITIONAL FICTION
Doubles in a Game of Chance
A surreal and haunting novel centered on a bureaucratic nightmare, following a disoriented protagonist trapped in an absurd, relentless system.
Man Alone: The Dark Book
A deeply introspective and shadowed narrative examining solitude, identity, and the darker edges of the human psyche.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
November 12, 2015
Reposting a review of Satori by V. Jill Davis:
http://goo.gl/j738On
ByV. Jill Davis on December 9, 2014
Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
Jack Remick says that meeting Ferlinghetti, “godfather of the Beat Movement,” began his intention to become a poet. Satori, Poems also recalls another sixties’ artist, singer/songwriter Robbie Basho. The following words on Basho also describe Jack Remick:
“A delver into levels of consciousness he looked into the abyss and made it back changed but was able to share some of what he experienced through his music.” (DreamWeaver dot blogspot dot com)
Satori is more gritty and realistic, but like Basho he steps from the ordinary world into deeper fundamentals. It’s as if he has answered the hero’s journey call, and makes live for others his obstacles, ordeals, and victories.
As someone whose gravitates to Jane Austen rather than Hemingway, at times I felt as if overhearing guys in a bar. Yet the skill and intricate meanings of the poems create an artistic integrity and significance, like Baudelaire, incorporating all and transcending all.
There are many talented writers today, and some put in the work to learn the craft. Satori has all that plus the ever-elusive dream chased by medieval troubadours, the search for life’s deeper meanings. The sheer force of sound, craftsmanship, and insight combines to make Satori a commentary on our search for the meanings that can draw the world together and get people of all creeds, cultures, and colors through this difficult time.
In my opinion, Satori is a book to be read over time. Each poem deserves its own space. My favorite poem is Anabasis.
“I see you, the one I fear most,
your vengeful mouth opens into an infinite night
of infinite pain…
…….
Where do you find the hub of the wheel?
And measure the emptiness of a bowl?
How do you fill the empty of absence?
…….
“I will dig in sands to uncover you gold
as a statue of Astarte or a marble Elgin missed
as Athena dead five thousand years.
"I will find you leading a revolution among the dead
demanding more life and love and sunlight.
Your are everywhere I look.
You hide in the immeasurable caverns of poems
your taste wanders on sea currents
to fill the sails of ships and wings of migrating birds."
http://goo.gl/j738On
ByV. Jill Davis on December 9, 2014
Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
Jack Remick says that meeting Ferlinghetti, “godfather of the Beat Movement,” began his intention to become a poet. Satori, Poems also recalls another sixties’ artist, singer/songwriter Robbie Basho. The following words on Basho also describe Jack Remick:
“A delver into levels of consciousness he looked into the abyss and made it back changed but was able to share some of what he experienced through his music.” (DreamWeaver dot blogspot dot com)
Satori is more gritty and realistic, but like Basho he steps from the ordinary world into deeper fundamentals. It’s as if he has answered the hero’s journey call, and makes live for others his obstacles, ordeals, and victories.
As someone whose gravitates to Jane Austen rather than Hemingway, at times I felt as if overhearing guys in a bar. Yet the skill and intricate meanings of the poems create an artistic integrity and significance, like Baudelaire, incorporating all and transcending all.
There are many talented writers today, and some put in the work to learn the craft. Satori has all that plus the ever-elusive dream chased by medieval troubadours, the search for life’s deeper meanings. The sheer force of sound, craftsmanship, and insight combines to make Satori a commentary on our search for the meanings that can draw the world together and get people of all creeds, cultures, and colors through this difficult time.
In my opinion, Satori is a book to be read over time. Each poem deserves its own space. My favorite poem is Anabasis.
“I see you, the one I fear most,
your vengeful mouth opens into an infinite night
of infinite pain…
…….
Where do you find the hub of the wheel?
And measure the emptiness of a bowl?
How do you fill the empty of absence?
…….
“I will dig in sands to uncover you gold
as a statue of Astarte or a marble Elgin missed
as Athena dead five thousand years.
"I will find you leading a revolution among the dead
demanding more life and love and sunlight.
Your are everywhere I look.
You hide in the immeasurable caverns of poems
your taste wanders on sea currents
to fill the sails of ships and wings of migrating birds."
January 9, 2015
In Satori, poems, Jack Remick grabs our hand and leads us on a breathless, mystical, raw and relentless coming of age journey from boy to man to poet in search of satori, a spiritual awakening. There is no stopping once you read the first lines of this book. You will run from one poem to the next, rushing by vivid descriptions and captured details on a wave that makes you wonder if you've ever actually seen the world and question how much you’ve missed.
From the first lines of breathless, “I took first communion on the steps of the Jazz Cellar too young to buy my own booze, too dumb to steal it…” we are breathless and follow young Remick, “I grew wiser and pseudo-wise-I created canticles to the monsters of my ego and id…” to The City of Saint Francis where “…I patrolled Grant Street at 2 AM hoping fame still grew like magic mushrooms from the cracks where my heroes ate, read, bled.”
We meet artists of the era, such as Mauritz Cornelius Escher, “Twenty-three years into his death-stream this man still aches his bones down to the asphalt city curled like a lizard writing in rain he still feeds me his mind heat his voice says-build a world of black and white…” and Remick's mentor, Jack Moodey, “…That head burst open on the slick wet stone in the shower And poetry died…”.
In Midnite and Josie Smells Sweet, we meet brown-skinned Josie Delgado in her white shorts, “…Saturday nite, Josie, another world in those lips that mouth, that hair, that skin-Josie is one hundred percent mine…” who asks, “Will you kill yourself for me?” and then broke hearts by her untimely death.
Youthful lust, raw living, the building of America, and Death Waits, “Death waits at the corner/an old woman for the light…” and from Honey Word of Jesus Christ, “…One Sunday, I grew Old. One Sunday I learned of the Man in Me…”.
Once you catch your breath after reading the last line, you will return to page one to savor the haunting rhythm of Jack Remick’s life and the men and women who taught him what he knows. I highly recommend Satori, poems!
From the first lines of breathless, “I took first communion on the steps of the Jazz Cellar too young to buy my own booze, too dumb to steal it…” we are breathless and follow young Remick, “I grew wiser and pseudo-wise-I created canticles to the monsters of my ego and id…” to The City of Saint Francis where “…I patrolled Grant Street at 2 AM hoping fame still grew like magic mushrooms from the cracks where my heroes ate, read, bled.”
We meet artists of the era, such as Mauritz Cornelius Escher, “Twenty-three years into his death-stream this man still aches his bones down to the asphalt city curled like a lizard writing in rain he still feeds me his mind heat his voice says-build a world of black and white…” and Remick's mentor, Jack Moodey, “…That head burst open on the slick wet stone in the shower And poetry died…”.
In Midnite and Josie Smells Sweet, we meet brown-skinned Josie Delgado in her white shorts, “…Saturday nite, Josie, another world in those lips that mouth, that hair, that skin-Josie is one hundred percent mine…” who asks, “Will you kill yourself for me?” and then broke hearts by her untimely death.
Youthful lust, raw living, the building of America, and Death Waits, “Death waits at the corner/an old woman for the light…” and from Honey Word of Jesus Christ, “…One Sunday, I grew Old. One Sunday I learned of the Man in Me…”.
Once you catch your breath after reading the last line, you will return to page one to savor the haunting rhythm of Jack Remick’s life and the men and women who taught him what he knows. I highly recommend Satori, poems!
May 25, 2014
Satori, by Jack Remick deserves five stars, even though this collection of poems is a kick to the gut and a punch to the throat. It's painful and sad, but also haunting and beautiful. I have my favorites, like `Josie Delgado' because of story and image. The images got to me. The images made it real.
Jack Remick's words made me stop breathing. They made me hesitate, made me place my finger between the pages and almost close the book, to consider what I had read. The entries were often wild, humorous, or tragic and sometimes so lovely my eyes burned and my throat ached.
Even if you seldom read poetry you'll understand poetry better after reading Satori. You'll understand why there are poets and why there are readers of poetry . . . because the power of the word is condensed in poetry like cream rising to the surface of common milk. Satori is fireweed honey. It's the helium balloon that escaped the vendor's grip and floated across an ocean to a mythical world.
Get a copy. Savor it. You'll be enlightened.
Jack Remick's words made me stop breathing. They made me hesitate, made me place my finger between the pages and almost close the book, to consider what I had read. The entries were often wild, humorous, or tragic and sometimes so lovely my eyes burned and my throat ached.
Even if you seldom read poetry you'll understand poetry better after reading Satori. You'll understand why there are poets and why there are readers of poetry . . . because the power of the word is condensed in poetry like cream rising to the surface of common milk. Satori is fireweed honey. It's the helium balloon that escaped the vendor's grip and floated across an ocean to a mythical world.
Get a copy. Savor it. You'll be enlightened.
July 21, 2014
I was fortunate to watch Jack Remick read "Josie Delgado, A Poem of the Central Valley" at a Seattle bookstore. The experience was powerful, moving and memorable. So when I opened SATORI, Remick's latest collection of poetry from Coffee Town Press, finding "Josie Delgado" in print was a joy, the words there on the page to be read and reread, the power and shot-gun rhythm of Remick's voice ringing in my ears.
But SATORI is much more than "Josie Delgado". The collection of seven sections offers readers, and non-poetry readers like myself, a rich collection of musical narrative not to be missed. It is a collection to read and reread,to cherish and share.
But SATORI is much more than "Josie Delgado". The collection of seven sections offers readers, and non-poetry readers like myself, a rich collection of musical narrative not to be missed. It is a collection to read and reread,to cherish and share.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews