Nonlinear Equations for Growing Better Olives

by Edward Nudelman

78 pages, Paperback

Published October 28, 2023

About the author

Edward Nudelman’s full-length poetry collections include: Nonlinear Equations for Growing Better Olives, Kelsay Books, 2023 Thin Places (Salmon Poetry, forthcoming, 2025); Out of Time, Running (Harbor Mountain, 2014); What Looks Like an Elephant (Lummox, 2011); and Night Fires (Pudding House, 2009). Poems have appeared in Rattle, Cortland Review, Valparaiso Review, Chiron Review, Evergreen Review, Floating Bridge, Plainsongs, Penwood Review, Poets and Artists, and many more. Awards include: finalist in 2019 Atlanta Review International Poetry Contest (two poems), honorable mention in 2019 Passager Poetry Contest, second place for the Indie Lit Awards Book of the Year (What Looks Like an Elephant), semifinalist for the Journal Award, OSU Press (Night Fires), and a Pushcart nomination.

A native Seattleite, Nudelman is a recently retired cancer research scientist, and owns/operates a rare bookshop (est. 1980) where he lives in Seattle, with his wife, dog, and five ducks.

Reviews

[Barbara Koefod · Rating 5 out of 5]

The best art is accessible, with profound depth and meaning in layers just below the thin veneer of quotidian subjects. "Breakfast Chat," coaxing us from a fragrant kitchen, a grandmother making perfect eggs, to "...explaining how the yolk of peace and tolerance broke. When she finally sat down, I learned how many had died in the camps. And how they died."
Edward Nudelman's poems limn the fragility of all life. There is a summons to savor moments of exquisite wholeness and ephemeral beauty, because it eventually all ends.
"Getting To the End:"
"On a walk by the pond overshadowed by oaks,
my old dog pulls me along like a tow truck,
through a shimmering violet dusk I barely see...
At fourteen, I can't let her jump in to swim.
I'm perhaps as badly worn, though less hampered,
pulling heavily on the leash, a bit crestfallen.
The long path home shortens and narrows,
as I desire more of what slips away--
forgetting what I've gained along the way."
Even in the poems that take scientific vernacular to levels understood mainly by the erudite researcher or scientist, there is common theme: We're all in this together. Attend to the amazing present and be sure to see the absurd humor in it all. This reminder of the ways in which our vulnerability defines and unites us is described stunningly in Edward's account of the teenage friend holding up a jokey front as he dies too young; the Boys Of Summer, tested for the virus, "...just looking for a good pitch to hit;" and all of us holding our precious memories of those who have, like Sofie dog, crossed "...the threshold of another adventure, into the brilliance of her beyond."
"Nonlinear Equations for Growing Better Olives" is a treasure of a collection. One can reread every poem, only to find a new intriguing, hilarious and heartbreaking epiphany every time.

[Mary · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great read with acrobatic turns of a phrase and beautiful imagery. Look forward to perusing again soon. FIVE STARS!

[Edward Nudelman · Rating 5 out of 5]

From a poem in the book:

“I liked my career in biochemical oncology,
but the nomenclature bored me, lacking
the spice of common names and not conveying
the architecture of discovery and wonder.”

Therefore, Edward Nudelman became a poet. One of the great pleasures of this collection is seeing the natural world as inflected by his scientist’s mind and poet’s heart. The result is a poetry unlike anything I’ve read before. Nudelman’s “architecture of discovery and wonder” reveals, again and again the miraculous and revelatory in the ordinary world around us. He shows us what we’ve missed. And isn’t that why we came to poetry in the first place? Nonlinear Equations for Growing Better Olives is one of the freshest, most bracingly intelligent books I’ve read in a very long time.

-George Bilgere, author of six collections of poetry, includingThe White Museum (2010), which was awarded the Autumn House Poetry Prize; Haywire (2006), which won the May Swenson Poetry Award; and The Good Kiss (2002), which was selected by Billy Collins to win the University of Akron Poetry Award.


Mixing the nomenclature of science with poignant metaphors drawn from the natural world, personal experience and acute observation, Edward Nudelman’s Nonlinear Equations for Growing Better Olives is lit by wings, by fish, by lizards, by trout, by blackbirds and all manner of beings. A biochemical oncologist, Nudelman’s clinical vocabulary makes a contrapuntal contrast with his accessible imagery as he dives deep into an exploration of the nature of the universe and the complex world around him. Nudelman’s imagery is infused with beauty. In “Unhinged,” he writes, “Morning sun blisters through a window—alpine/rivers fill with trout—the current, a rippling arrow.” Nudelman is at his finest in lines like, “Archimedes grabbed/a lever, and the Earth/moved an inch off center./Gravity has you by your feet/but your heart remains/a secret in the sway/of cloud and pillar.” I greatly admire his deft use of music in lines like, “I’ve strummed a palm leaf to silence/my mind’s electronic hissing, jettisoned/trigonometry in favor of a few visions/describing the lure of commonplace.” This unique book of poems strikes all the right chords, making an important addition to any library.

Pamela Uschuk- Author of seven poetry collections include Crazy Love (American Book Award), Blood Flower, and Refugee. Translated into twelve languages, her work appears widely in Poetry, Ploughshares, and other journals. Awards include National League of American PEN Women, prizes from Ascent, New Millenium,& Amnesty International. She is the Editor of Cutthroat Poetry Journal.

BIO, EDWARD NUDELMAN

Edward Nudelman’s full-length poetry collections include: Thin Places (Salmon Poetry, forthcoming, 2025); Out of Time, Running (Harbor Mountain, 2014); What Looks Like an Elephant (Lummox, 2011); and Night Fires (Pudding House, 2009). Poems have appeared in Rattle, Cortland Review, Valparaiso Review, Chiron Review, Evergreen Review, Floating Bridge, Plainsongs, Penwood Review, Poets and Artists, and many more. Awards include: finalist in 2019 Atlanta Review International Poetry Contest (two poems), honorable mention in 2019 Passager Poetry Contest, second place for the Indie Lit Awards Book of the Year (What Looks Like an Elephant), semifinalist for the Journal Award, OSU Press (Night Fires), and a Pushcart nomination.

A native Seattleite, Nudelman is a recently retired cancer research scientist, and owns/operates a rare bookshop (est. 1980) where he lives in Seattle, with his wife, dog, and five ducks.

Paperback: 78 pages
Publisher: Kelsay Books (October 28, 2023)

[Boris Glikman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ed Nudelman never fails to impress with his elegantly wrought poems of wonder. One of my favourites in this collection is "Breakfast Chat". This poem is poignantly apposite for the times that we are living through, as well as being remarkably prescient (for it, most probably, was written prior to the events of October 7th). The metaphor that this poem employs of peace and tolerance being as fragile as an egg yolk expresses so well the phenomenon that we are now experiencing, of the old hatreds exploding out into the open again, as if the past never happened and as if nothing was learned from the past. "On a Rock Wall" is another poem that appeals to me, both in its exquisite imagery (with such evocative lines as "...while raptors Etch-a-Sketch concentric circles overhead, Venn diagramming me away from fear, toward the wonder of the sun...") and in its imaginative subject matter. This poem allows us to visualise life as experienced through the consciousness of a reptile (its subtitle could almost be "What it is like to be a Lizard?") . "Death's Apprentice" is another favourite, giving us an intimate look into the private life of the Grim Reaper and showing us that the reaper is just like the rest of us really, with the same needs, desires and family troubles. The line that this poem ends with "as the train he steers dopplers through each station...to collect the next unwilling passenger."
could be adapted as a description of "Nonlinear Equations for Growing Better Olives" itself, as with this book Ed Nudelman has surely collected many new WILLING passengers on his train of fans of his poetry.

[JP · Rating 5 out of 5]

I purchased this collection of poems wondering what I might learn from a passionate cancer research scientist and author from my hometown. Ed Nudelman's scientific and academic vocabulary challenges mine, but the messages within his reflections and heartfelt poems are not lost.

So far I have marked three as favorites. On a second read of one from Ed's youth, I was brought to tears. As a non scientist, I can tell you these poems will move you to a new awareness. I continue to make notes and wonder about Ed's childhood and life's journey. Nonlinear Equations for Growing Better Olives will take you to new places and expand your understanding of a life different than your own.

Thank you, Ed Nudelman, for inviting us to share what you have experienced through nature, relationships and acute awareness.

[Pris Campbell · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve been a fan of Ed Nudelman’s poetry for years but this book even overreached my already high expectations. A scientist clones with the poetic word and all sorts of images emerge. His family comes alive throughout the book all the way from hacking weeds, fishtailing down the highway with his dad( a favorite), to hidden treasures found in his grandfather’s side of the closet. A poem about his grandmother and the secrets of the Holocaust is especially moving. We also have romance and the love for a dying dog. The book is a grab bag of treasures. Stick in your hand and another emotion emerges. I can’t recommend this book enough.
Pris Campbell, author of My Southern Childhood and Truth and Other Lies, among other poetry books.

[Stephen W. · Rating 5 out of 5]

What “good reads” of each of these poems. I read the book cover to cover as soon as I received it in the mail. I was keeping a list of my favorites until I realized that I was listing nearly all of them. Written from real life experiences of family relationships, pets, the blooms of environment and you name it, Nudelman is constantly crafting poems about it all. My vocabulary grows as I read, for new words are introduced to my mind while contemplating the kaleidoscope of this poets scintillating dictionary of soul. Clashing and harmonizing his choice of words penetrate both mind and spirit producing new thoughts and old memories. Enjoyable to say the least.

[Reader · Rating 5 out of 5]

I first met Ed Nudelman as an esteemed scientist. Imagine my delight to learn that he also has the heart of a poet. The Juxtaposition is brilliant. This collection is thoughtful, creative, beautiful…

[Michael Parker · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ed Nudelman's latest poetry book, Nonlinear Equations For Growing Better Olives, is an endearing, solid gold collection of poems about how "we wonder what may escape/the gravity of our lives" ("The Thing With Feathers") and how we remember the things that mean something to us and the seemingly fleeting, impermanence of life: how seasons change; the cells of living things perform their job and then wear out and die; and how those we love (grandparents, parents, and even pets) pass away and leave nothing more than cherished memories.
(Read the Full Review of this Collection in The Penwood Review, Fall 2024)