Breathing for Clouds

by Christopher Reilley

Christopher Reilley's latest collection, Breathing for Clouds, has an emotional and architectural grandeur built page after page, written in many shapes, moods and even styles. In "A Digital Voice," Reilley writes, "I speak in puddles/but I write in oceans." Everything in this book is big, "like an old dozing elephant," embracing not only the whole of human emotion - love of child, of woman, of abuser, sadness, rage - but crossing literary genres, too, with the gritty noir prose pieces "Tales from the Grand Cafe," the poignant "An Open Letter to my Daughters," and of course, "Sabbath in Paradise." Breathing for Clouds does not look away or let up - ever. In its epic scope, in its muscularity of language, Reilley states, "In my greed, I offer you all I have." Who dares offer themselves like this? Jennifer Colella Martelli, Apostrophe Christopher Reilley deftly draws the reader from sentiment to the heartbreak of human folly. The sweetness of his poems and prose for his daughters, "Open Letter..." and the wistful "Pick Me A Winner" contrast starkly with pieces that detail darker visions, like "The Grand Cafe" tales and poems of crumbling relationships. The yearning "Danger Days" artfully applies middle age sensibility to reflections of youthful adventures. With wit, wry turn of the rhyme, and keen instinct, Breathing for Clouds invites us to view modern life through Reilley's lens. Richard Fox, Time Bomb ..".the Chuck Norris of poetry." Catherine Thorpe, In a Celadine World In Breathing for Clouds, Christopher Reilley (Poet Laureate of Dedham, Ma.) walks us on a tightrope, brings us to the edge of a tall building, and places us on the brink of life-changing decisions. His poems hit us universally as we are all on the verge, tittering above our changing situations. Do we choose to take action or to not take action and continue to sink? Check it out! Timothy Gager, The Shutting Door

Kindle Edition

First published September 6, 2014

Reviews

[Vi Nao]

In “Poets Starve” Christopher Reilley writes, “Poverty is a poem that dies just after you decide not to read it.” The poet, father of two girls and husband to a loving wife, insists that the readers shouldn’t “doom him to dust”. So quickly get away from your ‘digital acquaintances’ and read his work. There are lines that will blow you back to nostalgia, the ‘meat and drink’ of our consciousness. Lines such as “her breath is redolent of bathtub gin” which leap out of the poetic livestream and into a dream sequence, so macabre you wish you were impoverished like starved poetry. More than poems, Reilley offers readers comical wisdom, which behaves more like an aphorism. On page 90, Reilly suggests, “The more you give away the more you have. In my greed I offer you all I have.” In this collection of five stories, one vulnerable letter to his daughters, and some 93 poems, Reilley is giving all he has to the world. And so much more. He writes about the heartbreak of 911, Mike Tyson’s rape sentence. He writes about perseverance, time, death, sexual foreplay, love, animals, cloud kissing, and language. His open letter to his daughters was very touching. He even carves out a place in his poetry for a cat: “The cat asleep in the sunny window is not carved from stone.” Other times, he talks leisurely about summer. Here he writes, “The air is so thick with summer I feel the sun has buttered me like a muffin.” Reilley’s poems and stories are filled with humor and tenderness. There is something innocent and loving about his work. Even his flight to reach out to readers is sincere. Here he addresses us directly like a famous Roman orator, “Speak to me, dear reader, answer my plea,/ let me know what you want me to write/ For if, even for a moment, I thought I was wrong/ I would move mountains to make things all right.” Answer him, dear reader, so you may get kissed by a cloud.
P.S. Reilly: Will you write about arrogant telephone booths or spatulas that know how to memorize the zip code of an egg yolk?

[Christopher]

You can buy this book directly from the indie publisher at https://www.bigtablepublishing.com/pr...

This is intended to be a very eclectic collection of poems, the title poem explains that the connection between poet and reader is such that anytime, anyplace, we can have a communication, and the reader will find something that touches their heart.