Loves

by Susan Budd

"Loves" is a fantasia of passion, temptation, and redemption. The lovers in this collection of twenty-five story poems are drawn from the pages of literature and life. An innocent Eve succumbs to the wily serpent in the Garden of Eden. A fairy tale princess longs for her knight. A lovesick woman goes mad in a Shakespearean nightmare. Newlyweds revel in sensuality. A young widow dreams of her beloved. A beautiful hippie finds magic in the mundane. In settings that range from gardens of paradise to dark woods of despair, the characters in this volume experience loves both sacred and profane, from the innocence of puppy love to the decadence of forbidden love, from the obsession of unrequited love to the melancholy of lost love. And it all begins with an apple.

102 pages, Paperback

Published December 28, 2018

About the author

Metaphysical questions about consciousness and dreams have always fascinated me. From childhood, I loved reading fantasies, myths, and fairy tales. I loved reverie and introspection. Later I studied philosophy of mind and the spiritual mysticism of East and West. I explored visionary literature and art. I scrutinized my own mind. Now I’m a professor of philosophy and literature at the City University of New York.

My first book was Visions, a montage of psychedelic dream poems. Visions was born of my fascination with the mind and its modes of perception. It was also strongly influenced by my love of art and music. My novella, Felicity, is a dreamlike philosophical fable about the nature of reality and the meaning of life.