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Touch Each Other
"Touch Each Other" explores the eros spirit from before birth to after death, from inside the womb and outside during the arc of life and love and beyond death into endless beyond. These poems touch on pregnancy, birth, motherhood, love and freedom from the maya of human sphere, while also touching on aging, death and the dream of rebirth. Here are poems where human genitals are dramatis personae touched by their own poignant majesty and mortality, where death and love come together in a visionary orgasm at last and the wind whispers softly to every ear "Touch each other." Here are poems that may touch you like a mother, a lover, a friend, and the starry night sky.
- GenresPoetry
40 pages
First published January 1, 2013
1 person is currently reading
9 people want to read
About the author
Antler
34 books8 followersAntler (born Brad Burdick; 1946 in Wauwatosa, Wisconsin, U.S.) is an American poet who lives in Wisconsin.
Among other honors, Antler received the Whitman Prize from the Walt Whitman Association, given to the poet "whose contribution best reveals the continuing presence of Walt Whitman in American poetry," in 1985. Antler also was awarded the Witter Bynner prize in 1987. Antler was the poet laureate of the city of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, for 2002 and 2003. He is also an advocate for wilderness protection.
Education and career
Antler received a bachelor's degree in anthropology from the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee in 1970. Later he completed a master's degree in English from the same university after spending some time at the noted Iowa Writers' Workshop at the University of Iowa. During the 1970s he also worked at various factory and other jobs just long enough to get money to support his poetry writing and time spent in wilderness areas across the United States.
Antler's first major work, the long poem Factory, was published by Lawrence Ferlinghetti's City Lights Bookstore in 1980. Allen Ginsberg declared him as "one of Whitman's `poets and orators to come'". The collection Last Words appeared in 1986 from Ballantine Books, and Antler: The Selected Poems was published in 2000 by Soft Skull Press. He has also published several chapbooks and has contributed to numerous local, national, and international journals and anthologies.
Writing style
His work reflects the influences of Walt Whitman, Allen Ginsberg, and the American traditions of transcendentalism and environmentalism. He celebrates the wilderness, often comparing urban, industrial life unfavorably with natural phenomena. His frank, sometimes earthy poems frequently exhibit sexual and spiritual energy entwined with the wonder of the natural world.
Among other honors, Antler received the Whitman Prize from the Walt Whitman Association, given to the poet "whose contribution best reveals the continuing presence of Walt Whitman in American poetry," in 1985. Antler also was awarded the Witter Bynner prize in 1987. Antler was the poet laureate of the city of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, for 2002 and 2003. He is also an advocate for wilderness protection.
Education and career
Antler received a bachelor's degree in anthropology from the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee in 1970. Later he completed a master's degree in English from the same university after spending some time at the noted Iowa Writers' Workshop at the University of Iowa. During the 1970s he also worked at various factory and other jobs just long enough to get money to support his poetry writing and time spent in wilderness areas across the United States.
Antler's first major work, the long poem Factory, was published by Lawrence Ferlinghetti's City Lights Bookstore in 1980. Allen Ginsberg declared him as "one of Whitman's `poets and orators to come'". The collection Last Words appeared in 1986 from Ballantine Books, and Antler: The Selected Poems was published in 2000 by Soft Skull Press. He has also published several chapbooks and has contributed to numerous local, national, and international journals and anthologies.
Writing style
His work reflects the influences of Walt Whitman, Allen Ginsberg, and the American traditions of transcendentalism and environmentalism. He celebrates the wilderness, often comparing urban, industrial life unfavorably with natural phenomena. His frank, sometimes earthy poems frequently exhibit sexual and spiritual energy entwined with the wonder of the natural world.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
April 16, 2016
Ah, Antler. I loved Last Words & have bought it twice, due to it being one I carried with me often, thus being lost last year when some creeps mugged me. I figured I owed it to myself & him also to see what's cooking these days. The answer is: exactly what you'd expect. Given this is not a decades-spanning career overview, but simply a recent collection, there are (predictably) a lot of references to blowjobs & genitals which get to be a bit much, at least in such a small space.
But as with Last Words, I'm sure I will read this again & again throughout the years. There's not one 'bad' poem in the collection. Antler is still full of his (somehow) innocent love & poetic worldview, & the great gift he gives is that he uses every chance he gets to remind you of something beautiful.
This book is beautiful. I want to kiss his forehead.
Favourites
Feral
Dream
Some nice lines:
So that's why Death sends no one's corpse back
as unpublishable
- That's Why
No wonder we're floundering when
no wonder is why we're floundering!
- Redressing the Balance
Prove to me beyond the shadow of a doubt
why the epiphany zillions of planets
have Utopias on them
can't be legal tender.
- Prove to Me
N.B. the 4 is slightly biased, it's more a 3.5 & would probably be leaning to the lower end if you didn't feel as warmed by him as I do.
But as with Last Words, I'm sure I will read this again & again throughout the years. There's not one 'bad' poem in the collection. Antler is still full of his (somehow) innocent love & poetic worldview, & the great gift he gives is that he uses every chance he gets to remind you of something beautiful.
This book is beautiful. I want to kiss his forehead.
Favourites
Feral
Dream
Some nice lines:
So that's why Death sends no one's corpse back
as unpublishable
- That's Why
No wonder we're floundering when
no wonder is why we're floundering!
- Redressing the Balance
Prove to me beyond the shadow of a doubt
why the epiphany zillions of planets
have Utopias on them
can't be legal tender.
- Prove to Me
N.B. the 4 is slightly biased, it's more a 3.5 & would probably be leaning to the lower end if you didn't feel as warmed by him as I do.
April 1, 2014
Remember, I don't get poetry...so...this book is a little depressing. I understood what the poems meant, so that's a plus. I think I liked it?
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews