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Quitting Time
These new poems by Patrick Hansel are all really one poem, a sequence that is at its heart a great tribute of a son's love for his father unlike any I've read before. War, the Great Depression, homelessness, the hazards of farming, hair cutting and day work, this is the essential American immigrant story, a story of strife and rage and glory. "the eyes of the dead...will open like broken wings" - "And the earth remembers." Yes, and so do poets, remember and seek "Justice, mercy, bread.." Just we all need now, justice, mercy and bread. Amen. Philip Schultz, Pulitzer Prize winning poet, author of Failure and The God of Loneliness
Recalling the best of poems about fathers by their sons-those of Roethke, Thomas, Hayden, Li-Young Lee-the poems here are about generations and the vantage that maturity allows us on the personal past. Quitting Time is a family story, a story we sense that Cabello Hansel needed to tell, in poems he felt compelled to write. That he wrote them with such grace and craft, such candor and openheartedness is to our delight. And also to our getting of wisdom, because we learn a great deal from this book-about the Dust Bowl, about the War, and about the comings and goings of commerce in a one-man barber shop in a factory town.
In the end, poetry should offer readers an encounter with language they wouldn't experience otherwise. Such lines are many here, and they hold all the drama and heartache that goes unspoken from generation to generation, and which it is the poet's job to render. In Quitting Time, it is a job well done.
Richard Terrill Minnesota Book Award Winner Author of What Falls Away Is Always
Recalling the best of poems about fathers by their sons-those of Roethke, Thomas, Hayden, Li-Young Lee-the poems here are about generations and the vantage that maturity allows us on the personal past. Quitting Time is a family story, a story we sense that Cabello Hansel needed to tell, in poems he felt compelled to write. That he wrote them with such grace and craft, such candor and openheartedness is to our delight. And also to our getting of wisdom, because we learn a great deal from this book-about the Dust Bowl, about the War, and about the comings and goings of commerce in a one-man barber shop in a factory town.
In the end, poetry should offer readers an encounter with language they wouldn't experience otherwise. Such lines are many here, and they hold all the drama and heartache that goes unspoken from generation to generation, and which it is the poet's job to render. In Quitting Time, it is a job well done.
Richard Terrill Minnesota Book Award Winner Author of What Falls Away Is Always
94 pages, Paperback
First published February 10, 2020
5 people want to read
About the author
Patrick Cabello Hansel
7 books3 followersI am a poet, novelist, essayist and retired pastor, having served in inner city communities for over 40 years. I love teaching creative writing, working for justice, creating art, nature and laughing.
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Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
February 15, 2021
By habit, when I pick up a new volume of poems, I pick and choose randomly what to read in what order. It took very little time with Patrick Cabello’s Hansel’s new book, Quitting Time, to realize this was a collection to be savored like a good, multi- course meal, from beginning to end, slowly and thoughtfully, finding the nuances and sparks of flavor in each poem and section.
Quitting Time is Cabello Hansel’s tribute to the life of his father, Walter. It is also a deep reflection on the passage of time, the intricacies of memory, and the deep inter-twining of personal, family and world histories.
Cabello Hansel begins this story with his grandfather’s migration from Germany to the Dakotas around the turn of the last century. In the early poems, we see the imprint of farm life on the broad prairies on his American born father. He taps into the long ago past to re-imagine his father’s early experience and perception of the world from this vantage point, in rich and sensual language:
“ … all that moved
Upon the earth, under the earth
and above it, the vast Dakota
sky, a song that did not need
to be sung, but to be heard”
The narrative continues his father’s experience beginning school as a German speaking child during World War I, riding the rails looking for work though the Great Depression, and his combat experience in World War II, asking at one point
“How many boys
who grew up speaking German
in their farm homes
now launch missiles
into the cities of their distant cousins.”
Cabello Hansel enters this narrative as a baby, and explores his relationship with his father until his death.
Sons and fathers seldom have simple relationships. Cabello Hansel does not back away from the complex feelings of love and anger that fathers and sons live through as the author himself comes into adulthood. Just as world history informs the family history, the poet explores his shifting perception of his father as he simultaneously explores how he carries this relationship as he grows and ages himself. In this Cabello Hansel a presents the telling of a deep love with a remarkable honesty about the contradictions and paradox that real love must live. The poet’s frank presentation of this startles and jars the reader at times:
“Maybe then we might
Have been able to talk during those long
Teen years. But maybe you
Should stay dead until I write this.”
The narrative in this volume meanders as does the course of real life. The poet presents it in a non-hurried, reflective way. The voice shifts easily from that of a detached observer, to that of an intimate player in this story. At times poet writes as someone trying to remember fading dream.
All in all, this a wonderfully honest collection which fearless explores both Walter and Patrick’s life and experience in graceful and imaginative language. I highly recommend this book.
Quitting Time is Cabello Hansel’s tribute to the life of his father, Walter. It is also a deep reflection on the passage of time, the intricacies of memory, and the deep inter-twining of personal, family and world histories.
Cabello Hansel begins this story with his grandfather’s migration from Germany to the Dakotas around the turn of the last century. In the early poems, we see the imprint of farm life on the broad prairies on his American born father. He taps into the long ago past to re-imagine his father’s early experience and perception of the world from this vantage point, in rich and sensual language:
“ … all that moved
Upon the earth, under the earth
and above it, the vast Dakota
sky, a song that did not need
to be sung, but to be heard”
The narrative continues his father’s experience beginning school as a German speaking child during World War I, riding the rails looking for work though the Great Depression, and his combat experience in World War II, asking at one point
“How many boys
who grew up speaking German
in their farm homes
now launch missiles
into the cities of their distant cousins.”
Cabello Hansel enters this narrative as a baby, and explores his relationship with his father until his death.
Sons and fathers seldom have simple relationships. Cabello Hansel does not back away from the complex feelings of love and anger that fathers and sons live through as the author himself comes into adulthood. Just as world history informs the family history, the poet explores his shifting perception of his father as he simultaneously explores how he carries this relationship as he grows and ages himself. In this Cabello Hansel a presents the telling of a deep love with a remarkable honesty about the contradictions and paradox that real love must live. The poet’s frank presentation of this startles and jars the reader at times:
“Maybe then we might
Have been able to talk during those long
Teen years. But maybe you
Should stay dead until I write this.”
The narrative in this volume meanders as does the course of real life. The poet presents it in a non-hurried, reflective way. The voice shifts easily from that of a detached observer, to that of an intimate player in this story. At times poet writes as someone trying to remember fading dream.
All in all, this a wonderfully honest collection which fearless explores both Walter and Patrick’s life and experience in graceful and imaginative language. I highly recommend this book.
February 15, 2021
Patrick Cabello Hansel in “Quitting Time” (published by Atmosphere Press in 2021) has written an
epic tale of poems covering his father's life from boyhood to old age with a clear voice detailing a man facing the challenges of learning a new language, losing his mother at an early age, working through the depression, riding the rails in search of his next meal and opportunity, a soldier at war, a returning vet finding a career, raising a family, and working the garden at end of his life.
A story of this magnitude is rarely told with such compassion.
We are, no matter what we claim,
seed and egg, given and lost in darkness,
a wailing at the air, wind our first sound. (from Planting Your Garden)
These are songs of toil and struggle, bending to the ground with dirt under your fingernails. In
recalling Patricks own experiences with his father, he does't hold back his boyish wonder, adolescent
disappointment and distain, while never losing grip of the search for healing and redemption.
I wanted, father,
to know that something was left:
a bone leached by groundwater
and microbed down to a hard, gray thrust,
something an archeologist could scour:
something a child could uncover
digging mushrooms in the spring;
something I can hold onto, yelling
when the great flood comes; something
to pound on the earth, to make
all the dust jump. (from Final Wishes)
I recommend you read this book of poems in one setting, to experience the beauty, the weight and the
flight of searching and reaching far.
On our little living room hill, dirt
begat the common miracle:
seeds die and bear fruit,
and so do saviors. There
is mystery to that, there
is science, but finally
there is no answer.
There are songs, Father.
There is always this dirt.
My hands are like Magi
returning by another route:
empty, promising, still. (from At the Manger)
Reviewed by Yata Peinovich, singer/songwriter
epic tale of poems covering his father's life from boyhood to old age with a clear voice detailing a man facing the challenges of learning a new language, losing his mother at an early age, working through the depression, riding the rails in search of his next meal and opportunity, a soldier at war, a returning vet finding a career, raising a family, and working the garden at end of his life.
A story of this magnitude is rarely told with such compassion.
We are, no matter what we claim,
seed and egg, given and lost in darkness,
a wailing at the air, wind our first sound. (from Planting Your Garden)
These are songs of toil and struggle, bending to the ground with dirt under your fingernails. In
recalling Patricks own experiences with his father, he does't hold back his boyish wonder, adolescent
disappointment and distain, while never losing grip of the search for healing and redemption.
I wanted, father,
to know that something was left:
a bone leached by groundwater
and microbed down to a hard, gray thrust,
something an archeologist could scour:
something a child could uncover
digging mushrooms in the spring;
something I can hold onto, yelling
when the great flood comes; something
to pound on the earth, to make
all the dust jump. (from Final Wishes)
I recommend you read this book of poems in one setting, to experience the beauty, the weight and the
flight of searching and reaching far.
On our little living room hill, dirt
begat the common miracle:
seeds die and bear fruit,
and so do saviors. There
is mystery to that, there
is science, but finally
there is no answer.
There are songs, Father.
There is always this dirt.
My hands are like Magi
returning by another route:
empty, promising, still. (from At the Manger)
Reviewed by Yata Peinovich, singer/songwriter
February 13, 2021
I was very taken with Patrick Cabello Hansel's new collection of poems about the life of his father, a son of German immigrant parents who grew up in the Upper Midwest and headed across the ocean to fight "his cousins" in WWII. Hansel's poetry takes us inside those experiences and led me to imagine anew what some of my own ancestors navigated the many challenges that filled their lives. The poems about the aftermath of his father's time in the war speak to the life-long trauma that military combat often wreaks on individuals and their families. The longing of the son for a deeper relationship with his often-silent father is palpable in the poems and speaks to so many of our complicated relationships with those we love the most.
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February 6, 2021Reading Patrick Cabello Hansel’s new collection of poems, Quitting Time (Atmosphere Press), I was drawn into a deep longing that is, I believe, shared by many. It is the longing to have been able to see with our own eyes, to have touched, smelled and heard the sounds that met our fathers or mothers or anyone who has preceded us on this earth. In this book, Cabello Hansel walks along with his father, ‘I would have taken your hand in the night while you were sleeping, turned it over gently…’ The book tells the journey of an American generation through a son’s eyes. For those of us whose parents or grandparents lived in the early 20th century, the poems are a testament to that generation’s spirit, their pain and struggles, and their triumphs. In following the paths of those who forged them, we discover ourselves. We step forward on our own path, more grounded from birth, ‘a shock that grew into love with each breath…’ to our last days, ‘No more words. Not yet amen.’ This is a book for those who love, who love language, and who long to listen to the voices of those who came before us. ‘It is time to talk. I can see your eyes opening. I can hear you walking towards me.’
February 8, 2021
In “Quitting Time” Patrick Cabello Hansel has written a deeply personal book on the life of his father. We learn what it was like for this child of German immigrants to grow up on the plains of North Dakota (plains I know well); live through the great depression, the dust bowl, and World War II; and with farming no longer an option find a new vocation in a new community. One verse that exemplifies for me the power of Patrick’s writing, reflecting on his father as a child in North Dakota in 1918, is this: “On the opposite side of the earth, ancestors march, guns riot, men talk and die. But this is not your war. Your war awaits many more turnings of the sun; it’s long claw knows your name; it will beckon.” I highly recommend this book to anyone who would value the opportunity to listen in as one person reflects on the life of his father and the world in which he and so many others lived.
February 4, 2021
What a startling set of poems. It’s touching, challenging, and great art. As personal as it is, it’s also a challenge to those who currently depersonalize immigrants. Do yourself a favor by buying it and lingering with it, please.
February 1, 2021
I do not think of myself as a "poetry person" but this collection reads almost narratively, like a story! It's a story that many of us need to hear and re-tell, of ancestors who came to the U.S. for a better life and were formed by all kinds of hardship. Hi word choices are evocative and meaningful. I highly recommend it!
February 2, 2021
An amazing journey in celebration of a father and family! Patrick Cabello Hansel is a master of painting a picture through his words, storytelling in prose. Captivating from start to finish! Thank you Pastor Patrick for this gift.
February 1, 2021
A tender view of a life and lives touched by it. The sweep of years through the progression of poems renders a life remembered, complex and dear. Definitely worth reading more than once.
February 1, 2021
Patrick Cabello Hansel has created more than a tribute to his father. It is a poetic love story; a biography of man who struggled and survived; a graphic journey through the ravages of the Depression; a brutal march though the fox holes of a World War; a blue collar insight of a barber eking out a living for his family. Patrick grabs you by your hand and by your emotions all the way to the final capstone poem. . .well worth the trip.
--George Dahlman--
--George Dahlman--
January 15, 2021
I loved it. I don't usually gobble down poetry but I completed the book in one day! Why, oh, why? Was it the Midwestern images of a hard working and hard suffering man? The familiar ring of a person with deep feelings layered over the years and expressing them in physicality rather than words? The drip, drip, drip of small events that add up to the shape of a man?
This is a personal and beautiful story in poems, told by an adult son, of a father's life and the hardships that shaped him. I so enjoyed reading it, reflecting on it and enjoying the imagery. It is thought provoking and beautifully written.
So many poems are standouts but I especially loved Cutting Away, Second Breakfast, Ferris Wheel, Quitting Time, and Austin Minnesota.
This is a personal and beautiful story in poems, told by an adult son, of a father's life and the hardships that shaped him. I so enjoyed reading it, reflecting on it and enjoying the imagery. It is thought provoking and beautifully written.
So many poems are standouts but I especially loved Cutting Away, Second Breakfast, Ferris Wheel, Quitting Time, and Austin Minnesota.
February 17, 2021
This book of poems are a tribute to the author's father, Walter, who lived through most of the 20th century. At first I wondered how deeply this book would be meaningful to me, since I didn't know his father or live through the same experiences, but my concerns were totally misplaced.
I think this is something we experience in all really good literature: that it's deeply, deeply particular, and yet somehow through that even more deeply universal. Reading about Walter's life (his childhood on a N. Dakota farm, his mother's death when he was young, great depression, war, life as a barber...) in these beautiful and true-feeling words opens up a window into the dignity, worth, loveliness and complexity of every life.
As a bonus: reading this book has made me feel especially close to my grandparents, who lived through many of the same experiences in a similar time and place. Maybe you have ancestors who lived through these events too?
I recommend this book - and I recommend that you read it cover-to-cover, like a story, because that's what it is.
I think this is something we experience in all really good literature: that it's deeply, deeply particular, and yet somehow through that even more deeply universal. Reading about Walter's life (his childhood on a N. Dakota farm, his mother's death when he was young, great depression, war, life as a barber...) in these beautiful and true-feeling words opens up a window into the dignity, worth, loveliness and complexity of every life.
As a bonus: reading this book has made me feel especially close to my grandparents, who lived through many of the same experiences in a similar time and place. Maybe you have ancestors who lived through these events too?
I recommend this book - and I recommend that you read it cover-to-cover, like a story, because that's what it is.
May 7, 2021
A gorgeous book of poems. Patrick's second work wows us with its powerful and deceptively simple language. He gets right to the marrow of love, memory and trauma, naming the traps and gifts that are folded into each. While his first work, The Devouring Land is about the many people he worked with, this is a more intimate glimpse into the poet's relationship with his father. The storytelling is direct, thoughtful, and accessible even to those who (like my partner) don't consider themselves "good at poetry." Quitting Time communicates the complexity of one of the most fundamental human relationships without pretense or preciousness. A must-read.
February 17, 2021
“My friend Patrick Cabello Hansel is launching his 2nd book of poetry “Quitting Time” on February 18 at 7 pm. “Quitting Time” is an homage to his father, who lived and loved through the trials and triumphs of the 20th century. The words he uses are sweet as honey and cold as the wind driving across the North Dakota plains. His poem "Mother Tongue" begins with these words, “1917 was a bad year to go to kindergarten in Langdon, North Dakota speaking only German.” The stories are poignant and depict great strength in this man Hansel loves.
February 16, 2021
Quitting Time is a powerful, intimate, and loving tribute to poet Patrick Cabello Hansel's father. He visits chapters of his father's life and celebrates their personal, sometimes complicated, but deep connection that continues to this day. As their story kept drawing me intensively through the book, it reminded me that this is history we all share. Quitting Time is a read that makes you grateful you were invited in.
January 8, 2021
Wrote it! Loved it! Try it!
February 17, 2021
I was transported through time and location by the words in this book. Life and relationships, love and war, are all so complicated, and that complexity shone through the pages.
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews