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Insomnia: Poems
These poems chart the journeys of sleepless nights when whole lifetimes seem to pass with their stories: loves lost and gained; children and seasons in their phases; and the world beyond, both threatening and enriching life.
From “Insomnia: 3 AM”
In the hour of the wolf
there is only
the clock
for company,
ticking
through the dark
remorseless
stations
of the night.
From “Insomnia: 3 AM”
In the hour of the wolf
there is only
the clock
for company,
ticking
through the dark
remorseless
stations
of the night.
96 pages, Hardcover
First published October 26, 2015
About the author
Linda Pastan
53 books66 followersIn 1932, Linda Pastan was born to a Jewish family in the Bronx. She graduated from Radcliffe College and received an MA from Brandeis University.
She is the author of Traveling Light (W. W. Norton & Co., 2011); Queen of a Rainy Country (2006); The Last Uncle (2002); Carnival Evening: New and Selected Poems 1968-1998 (1998), which was nominated for the National Book Award; An Early Afterlife (l995); Heroes In Disguise (1991), The Imperfect Paradise (1988), a nominee for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize; PM/AM: New and Selected Poems (l982), which was nominated for the National Book Award; The Five Stages of Grief (l978), and A Perfect Circle of Sun (l971).
About Pastan's The Five Stages of Grief, the poet May Sarton said, "It is about all her integrity that has made Linda Pastan such a rewarding poet. Nothing is here for effect. There is no self-pity, but in this new book she has reached down to a deeper layer and is letting the darkness in. These poems are full of foreboding and acceptance, a wry unsentimental acceptance of hard truth. They are valuable as signposts, and in the end, as arrivals. Pastan's signature is growth."
Among her many awards and honors include a Pushcart Prize, a Dylan Thomas Award, the Di Castagnola Award, the Bess Hokin Prize, the Maurice English Award, the Charity Randall Citation, and the 2003 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize. She was a recipient of a Radcliffe College Distinguished Alumnae Award.
From 1991 to 1995, she served as the Poet Laureate of Maryland, and was among the staff of the Breadloaf Writers Conference for twenty years. Linda Pastan lives in Potomac, Maryland.
She is the author of Traveling Light (W. W. Norton & Co., 2011); Queen of a Rainy Country (2006); The Last Uncle (2002); Carnival Evening: New and Selected Poems 1968-1998 (1998), which was nominated for the National Book Award; An Early Afterlife (l995); Heroes In Disguise (1991), The Imperfect Paradise (1988), a nominee for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize; PM/AM: New and Selected Poems (l982), which was nominated for the National Book Award; The Five Stages of Grief (l978), and A Perfect Circle of Sun (l971).
About Pastan's The Five Stages of Grief, the poet May Sarton said, "It is about all her integrity that has made Linda Pastan such a rewarding poet. Nothing is here for effect. There is no self-pity, but in this new book she has reached down to a deeper layer and is letting the darkness in. These poems are full of foreboding and acceptance, a wry unsentimental acceptance of hard truth. They are valuable as signposts, and in the end, as arrivals. Pastan's signature is growth."
Among her many awards and honors include a Pushcart Prize, a Dylan Thomas Award, the Di Castagnola Award, the Bess Hokin Prize, the Maurice English Award, the Charity Randall Citation, and the 2003 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize. She was a recipient of a Radcliffe College Distinguished Alumnae Award.
From 1991 to 1995, she served as the Poet Laureate of Maryland, and was among the staff of the Breadloaf Writers Conference for twenty years. Linda Pastan lives in Potomac, Maryland.
Ratings & Reviews
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 52 reviews
May 15, 2015
Linda Pastan has been writing poetry for nearly half a century, so I feel sheepish admitting I’d never heard of her before I requested this book at random. I’m so glad I did, though: these are excellent free verse poems, infused with images of weather, heavenly bodies, the night sky, art history, and travels. No rhymes to speak of, but plenty of alliteration and repetition – like in “Necklace,” where nearly every line ends with “pearl” or “pearls.” Historical and mythological references are frequent and highbrow. Especially in Part 3, the main theme is facing old age and illness; one of my favorites in the whole collection is “MRI”:
The final three poems are a perfect guide to approaching death with dignity. I’ll be sure to seek out more collections from Pastan.
Strapped down on my back
in a sci-fi spacecraft,
I wait, like an astronaut,
for liftoff. The mission:
to find the insidious comet
or meteor about to ruin
my hapless body.
Assaulted now
by sound (cymbals, cannons),
rat-tat-tat of firearms) and lost
in magnetic fields, I long
not for health but for simple quiet:
the storied silence
of outer space.
The final three poems are a perfect guide to approaching death with dignity. I’ll be sure to seek out more collections from Pastan.
April 5, 2017
Exercise
Two people come out of a building --
not out of a bar, not a priest and rabbi.
Out of a church, perhaps, after a wedding,
the steeple white and bridal,
or out of a bank with stolen money spilling
in green confetti from their pockets,
a youngish man and woman
in homemade masks,
or from a house on fire, stories behind them
blazing; stories growing like wildfire
in the forest of prose. But when
two people leave a building in a poem
the building could be the body
and the two: flesh and spirit; or it could
be the universe itself, Earth
and its moon spinning from the galaxy.
I'll take prose. I'll put myself to sleep
with stories as real as a mother and father
lying in the next room dreaming, as they prepare
to leave the building of my life.
Two people come out of a building --
not out of a bar, not a priest and rabbi.
Out of a church, perhaps, after a wedding,
the steeple white and bridal,
or out of a bank with stolen money spilling
in green confetti from their pockets,
a youngish man and woman
in homemade masks,
or from a house on fire, stories behind them
blazing; stories growing like wildfire
in the forest of prose. But when
two people leave a building in a poem
the building could be the body
and the two: flesh and spirit; or it could
be the universe itself, Earth
and its moon spinning from the galaxy.
I'll take prose. I'll put myself to sleep
with stories as real as a mother and father
lying in the next room dreaming, as they prepare
to leave the building of my life.
March 16, 2021
Lovely poems to read at night when you can’t sleep. One poem I loved:
IMAGINARY CONVERSATION
You tell me to live each day
as if it were my last. This is in the kitchen
where before coffee I complain
of the day ahead—that obstacle race
of minutes and hours,
grocery stores and doctors.
But why the last? I ask. Why not
live each day as if it were the first—
all raw astonishment, Eve rubbing
her eyes awake that first morning,
the sun coming up
like an ingénue in the east?
You grind the coffee
with the small roar of a mind
trying to clear itself. I set
the table, glance out the window
where dew has baptized every
living surface.
IMAGINARY CONVERSATION
You tell me to live each day
as if it were my last. This is in the kitchen
where before coffee I complain
of the day ahead—that obstacle race
of minutes and hours,
grocery stores and doctors.
But why the last? I ask. Why not
live each day as if it were the first—
all raw astonishment, Eve rubbing
her eyes awake that first morning,
the sun coming up
like an ingénue in the east?
You grind the coffee
with the small roar of a mind
trying to clear itself. I set
the table, glance out the window
where dew has baptized every
living surface.
June 9, 2015
(I received a copy of this from the publisher through Edelweiss in exchange for an honest review.)
I previously read two books of poetry by Linda Pastan. This volume reflects a life lived, with some poems about friends who have passed, the other side of cancer, the end of relationships, and more nature poems than I remember her having previously. (I suspect I need to find more poetry from poets in their 30s to feel a bit more of a shared experience, but this is not her fault of course.)
"The point is to follow the winding path
of words wherever it wants to take you, step
by step, ignoring the boulders, the barbed wire
fences, the rutted ditches choked with ragweed." (from "Remembering Stafford on His Centennial")
I previously read two books of poetry by Linda Pastan. This volume reflects a life lived, with some poems about friends who have passed, the other side of cancer, the end of relationships, and more nature poems than I remember her having previously. (I suspect I need to find more poetry from poets in their 30s to feel a bit more of a shared experience, but this is not her fault of course.)
"The point is to follow the winding path
of words wherever it wants to take you, step
by step, ignoring the boulders, the barbed wire
fences, the rutted ditches choked with ragweed." (from "Remembering Stafford on His Centennial")
July 16, 2017
A collection that grabs the attention quickly with its early poems, particularly the second poem, "Cosmology," which is rich with ghostly remembrances. The second section is too domestic and removed from the book's trajectory -- this book is a mediation on what it means to await a great departure, say from life itself. The third section carries on with some of part two's domesticity, but, by the end, the poems have regained the force of the initial section.
November 23, 2015
I love the first line of this collection of poems: "Sleep has stepped out for a smoke and may not be back."
February 1, 2016
Read these aloud and slip into the spaces the words open for wonder and reflection and murmuring "yes" and "amen". Themes: aging, dying, life, love.
May 7, 2018
Linda Pastan casts her unerring eye on the vagaries of old age and the looking shadow of death.
December 8, 2022
there are times when
anything feels
like a love poem
standing on line at the post office
for instance
waiting to lick
a stamp
i will buy with
the last loose
change in my pocket
(my own dna
anointing
the envelope)
so i can send you
this message
anything feels
like a love poem
standing on line at the post office
for instance
waiting to lick
a stamp
i will buy with
the last loose
change in my pocket
(my own dna
anointing
the envelope)
so i can send you
this message
September 23, 2019
I'm glad to have come across my first poem from Linda Pastan, and now I have read 3 of her books. She really speaks to me, perhaps partly because she is an "older" woman, as I am. But it is way more than that. I own this book, so I have turned down pages on my favorites and will read them with a fresh mind from time to time. Like any collection of poems, though, there are some I just don't relate to or "get." Maybe that will change.
August 16, 2024
poetry focused on sleep, poetry as craft, aging, and death. not a style/voice that would be a favorite for me, but each poem was impeccable & made me think.
September 5, 2025
I enjoyed the last section of the collection most. Will be reading more of her poetry.
December 2, 2015
Pastan is one of my favorite poets and her newest book is good. It's not five star great like some of her early work or Traveling Light, but I've found that few of my favorite poets' late work is of great depth or worth. This is not true of Pastan, and there are some really wonderful poems to cherish in here that I'll come back to again. Specifically, see "Ship's Clock," "Consider The Space Between Stars," "Imaginary Conversation," and "Love Poem Again." There's nothing "new" here in terms of the themes and techniques Pastan explores and uses, but there's plenty to love about her always wonderful eye, her precision, and the intense quiet of her poems. Thank you, Linda.
November 25, 2015
With her poetry, Linda Pastan lifts the mundane details of life into moments of epiphany. "You grind the coffee with the small roar of a mind trying to clear itself"
She connects travel experiences to emotional undercurrents of aging. The view of Vesuvio from a hotel room in Pompeii is "a peaceful-looking dragon/holding its fiery breath, biding its time."
Many of the poems are about aging and coming to terms with mortality. This is a beautiful collection, like all of Linda Pastan's work.
She connects travel experiences to emotional undercurrents of aging. The view of Vesuvio from a hotel room in Pompeii is "a peaceful-looking dragon/holding its fiery breath, biding its time."
Many of the poems are about aging and coming to terms with mortality. This is a beautiful collection, like all of Linda Pastan's work.
July 10, 2021
Sleepless nights, a lifetime, stories after stories, seasons, laughter, heartache, silence, rains and storms, mornings, darkness, time- all of it passes through the poetry of Linda Pastan, with dignity and elegance. A lucid and haunting collection.
August 13, 2015
I love Linda Pastan and her latest collection did not dissapoint.
April 2, 2018
I loved this book, love Linda Pastan. First read her decades ago, and now coming back to her work has been transformational: I understand so much more now how subversive she actually is...
October 6, 2020
Not for me.
February 6, 2023
I was rereading this collection when my wife told me Linda Pastan had just died at 90. Published when she was in her 80s, Insomnia includes many poems dealing with old age and impending death, poems of raw honesty and her characteristically arresting images.
Ghosts
We abandon the dead. We abandon them.
–Joseph Fasano
We abandon the dead as they
abandoned us. But sometimes
my mother’s ghost sits at the foot of the bed
trying to comfort me for all
the other losses: my father longing
to be forgiven, to forgive;
the long line of cousins and aunts
patiently waiting their turns
to be remembered; the dogs
who were my shadows once
whining now at the gates of the afterlife.
My mother smooths my pillow
as though it were a field of snow
ready to be plowed by dreams where
for brief moments my dead come back:
Jon as a toddler in my uncle’s army cap,
Franny with the rosary of days
slipping through her fingers.
At times I wander through
the library of graves, reading
the headstones, remembering a place
where the ashes I scattered once
blew back on the wind, staining
my forehead with their dark alphabet.
In the house where I grew up,
the same sentinel trees
shade the porch
as they shaded the green years
of my childhood when my dead
were alive and full of promise.
Ghosts
We abandon the dead. We abandon them.
–Joseph Fasano
We abandon the dead as they
abandoned us. But sometimes
my mother’s ghost sits at the foot of the bed
trying to comfort me for all
the other losses: my father longing
to be forgiven, to forgive;
the long line of cousins and aunts
patiently waiting their turns
to be remembered; the dogs
who were my shadows once
whining now at the gates of the afterlife.
My mother smooths my pillow
as though it were a field of snow
ready to be plowed by dreams where
for brief moments my dead come back:
Jon as a toddler in my uncle’s army cap,
Franny with the rosary of days
slipping through her fingers.
At times I wander through
the library of graves, reading
the headstones, remembering a place
where the ashes I scattered once
blew back on the wind, staining
my forehead with their dark alphabet.
In the house where I grew up,
the same sentinel trees
shade the porch
as they shaded the green years
of my childhood when my dead
were alive and full of promise.
July 25, 2024
"But why the last? I ask. Why not
live each day as if it were the first ---
all raw astonishment, Eve rubbing
her eyes awake that first morning,
the sun coming up
like an ingenue in the east?"
These poems represent the thoughts and musings that come into one's head while trying to sleep. We've all had moments where our brains simply refuse to "turn off" -- where we ponder life's grandest meanings, but also meaningless dribble. No matter the topic, they are all elevated to the ethereal in the hands of Pastan. There is a darkness to her writing; even when she's being wry, there is a severity underpinning the moment. She also possesses the indelible gift of being able to imbue a handful of words/phrases with tremendous significance. For that, this book deserves 5 stars.
Remembering Stafford on his Centennial:
When you said there was no such thing
as writer’s block if your standards
were low enough, everyone laughed
and I laughed too, but you meant it, didn’t you?
The point is to follow the winding path
of words wherever it wants to take you, step
by step, ignoring the boulders, the barbed wire
fences, the rutted ditches choked with ragweed.
How complicated such simplicities are.
Forget the destination, you taught us,
forget the applause; what matters is the journey.
And started one yourself, each morning.
live each day as if it were the first ---
all raw astonishment, Eve rubbing
her eyes awake that first morning,
the sun coming up
like an ingenue in the east?"
These poems represent the thoughts and musings that come into one's head while trying to sleep. We've all had moments where our brains simply refuse to "turn off" -- where we ponder life's grandest meanings, but also meaningless dribble. No matter the topic, they are all elevated to the ethereal in the hands of Pastan. There is a darkness to her writing; even when she's being wry, there is a severity underpinning the moment. She also possesses the indelible gift of being able to imbue a handful of words/phrases with tremendous significance. For that, this book deserves 5 stars.
Remembering Stafford on his Centennial:
When you said there was no such thing
as writer’s block if your standards
were low enough, everyone laughed
and I laughed too, but you meant it, didn’t you?
The point is to follow the winding path
of words wherever it wants to take you, step
by step, ignoring the boulders, the barbed wire
fences, the rutted ditches choked with ragweed.
How complicated such simplicities are.
Forget the destination, you taught us,
forget the applause; what matters is the journey.
And started one yourself, each morning.
May 30, 2019
I like Pastan's poetry because I find it "accessible," meaning I think I can usually understand it. (Other poets' works sometimes seem impenetrable to me.) After reading her poem titled "The Conservation of Matter" I went online, searching for a painting of orange horses with blue manes. I'm not convinced that I found it, but did learn about a new (to me) artist, Franz Marc. I'm pretty sure I DID find online an image of the Edward Hopper painting she referenced in "Edward Hopper, Untitled," and thought she did a great job of describing it:
An empty theatre: seats
shrouded in white
like rows of headstones;
the curtain about to rise
(or has it fallen?)
on a scene
of transcendental
silence.
And the audience?
A solitary figure sheathed
in black, a woman
in a hat perhaps
(more abstract
shape than woman)
sitting alone
in the cavernous dark.
(There's one more stanza, but I'm not going to copy it here.) So, all in all, I enjoyed this slim collection and recommend it for poetry readers.
An empty theatre: seats
shrouded in white
like rows of headstones;
the curtain about to rise
(or has it fallen?)
on a scene
of transcendental
silence.
And the audience?
A solitary figure sheathed
in black, a woman
in a hat perhaps
(more abstract
shape than woman)
sitting alone
in the cavernous dark.
(There's one more stanza, but I'm not going to copy it here.) So, all in all, I enjoyed this slim collection and recommend it for poetry readers.
January 4, 2023
Course of Treatment
After forty visits, after forty
invisible rays transformed
your body into something
as incandescent as a flashbulb,
they release you into
the world, where it hardly rained
those forty days, those nights, where
your ark was an old SUV shuttling you
back and forth along meandering
highways, taking their daily toll.
Now you embrace the ordinary again—
this small snow shower on the windshield,
which seems in its brevity
to have special meaning—
a shower of angel feathers perhaps,
or the bottle of wine we will
uncork in celebration,
its brothers waiting in a basement
redolent of the earth
you’ve once again escaped.
After forty visits, after forty
invisible rays transformed
your body into something
as incandescent as a flashbulb,
they release you into
the world, where it hardly rained
those forty days, those nights, where
your ark was an old SUV shuttling you
back and forth along meandering
highways, taking their daily toll.
Now you embrace the ordinary again—
this small snow shower on the windshield,
which seems in its brevity
to have special meaning—
a shower of angel feathers perhaps,
or the bottle of wine we will
uncork in celebration,
its brothers waiting in a basement
redolent of the earth
you’ve once again escaped.
March 4, 2023
Linda Pastan died recently, so I decided to check this out of the library. I am quite a bit younger than she was when she published these poems in 2015, but many of the thoughts on aging resonate, and I'm old enough to know when I am getting good advice. Or just encountering something beautiful or true.
The poems often have little moments of humor, like this passage about all the things the speaker never did, and now regrets: "As if I want to arrive at death / quite safe from harm, and innocent, locking the coffin lid / behind me so nothing dangerous can get in."
Lovely collection with many gems.
The poems often have little moments of humor, like this passage about all the things the speaker never did, and now regrets: "As if I want to arrive at death / quite safe from harm, and innocent, locking the coffin lid / behind me so nothing dangerous can get in."
Lovely collection with many gems.
December 23, 2017
The opening poem, “Insomnia: 3 AM,” is a gem, as is much of the first section. There are a couple of strong poems in the other two sections, but I least enjoyed the late-second, early-third because of the poems about writing. I don’t want to think about the writer in the act. It takes the intimacy out of it for me. But Pastan’s adventurous spirit and honesty makes it a worthwhile read, I think—I’ll be using “Insomnia” to teach myself how to write in the style of Pastan!
February 9, 2018
This is beautifully written. I especially loved the first part of the collection, the poems about/featuring nature were by far my favorites, such strong imagery and carefully chosen words. There were a few poems I didn't quite connect to, particulatly in the middle part, and that's why I'm torn between a 3.5 and a solid 4-star rating, but all the poems were masterfully crafted, so I really couldn't bring myself to give a lower rating.
February 6, 2023
precioso
“why not / live each day as if it were the first— / all raw astonishment, Eve rubbing / her eyes awake that first morning, / the sun coming up / like an ingénue in the east?”
“I shall bite into an apple / and swallow the seeds. / I shall come back as a tree.”
the gardener <3
“I half expect him to tend his trees / with aspirin and soup, the gardener / who finds in destruction / the very reason to carry on”
🌳💐🌿
“why not / live each day as if it were the first— / all raw astonishment, Eve rubbing / her eyes awake that first morning, / the sun coming up / like an ingénue in the east?”
“I shall bite into an apple / and swallow the seeds. / I shall come back as a tree.”
the gardener <3
“I half expect him to tend his trees / with aspirin and soup, the gardener / who finds in destruction / the very reason to carry on”
🌳💐🌿
October 11, 2020
Elegy
Our final dogwood leans
over the forest floor
offering berries
to the birds, the squirrels.
It's a relic
of the days when dogwoods
flourished- creamy lace in April,
spilled milk in May-
their beauty delicate
but commonplace.
When I took for granted
that the world would remain
as it was, and I
would remain with it.
Our final dogwood leans
over the forest floor
offering berries
to the birds, the squirrels.
It's a relic
of the days when dogwoods
flourished- creamy lace in April,
spilled milk in May-
their beauty delicate
but commonplace.
When I took for granted
that the world would remain
as it was, and I
would remain with it.
March 10, 2024
Pastan elegant touch on sleepless nights frames memories of our loss ones, life and the pass we leave under the blankets of an unmade bed. Casually simple but highly satisfying.
Favorites
Insomnia: 3 AM
Counting Sheep
Derecho
Root Ball
And Evening
The Conservation of Matter
Imaginary Conversation
MRI
Old Joke
Favorites
Insomnia: 3 AM
Counting Sheep
Derecho
Root Ball
And Evening
The Conservation of Matter
Imaginary Conversation
MRI
Old Joke
Read
November 16, 2019I never usually read poetry and some were confusing... I picked it up as I was into the topic of Insomnia... it wasn't how I expected it, but I really liked it, and enjoyed the use of language and how descriptive it was.
February 9, 2023
AT THE END OF THE 19TH CENTURY
A boneyard of old poems
rusts away, stanza
by creaking stanza.
Odes lose their polish;
couplets are torn
apart. And in a fertile
land, the odor
of free verse seeps
into the groundwater.
A boneyard of old poems
rusts away, stanza
by creaking stanza.
Odes lose their polish;
couplets are torn
apart. And in a fertile
land, the odor
of free verse seeps
into the groundwater.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 52 reviews