Discovering What to Say
Published on 15. October 2025
Book
Paperback/Softback
100 pages
978-1-961451-12-4 (ISBN)
Description
This collection of 39 poems, written over five years, chronicles the profound passages of later life-love deepened by loss, the solace found in nature, and the weight of memory. Written as the author's spouse, Tevis, lives with Alzheimer's in care, these verses don't dwell on illness but instead reveal how a life fully lived continues to discover what matters most.
The collection unfolds in four movements: intimate encounters with the natural world that offer both refuge and revelation; tributes to literary guides like Linda Gregg, Rilke, and Merwin; explorations of childhood's complex legacy; and meditations on sacred places-from the Lincoln statue at Chesterwood to quiet moments in Yale Divinity School Chapel.
Written from the vantage point of a septuagenarian, these poems grapple with essential questions: After a lifetime of experience, what deserves to be spoken? What can we offer to those we love, to ourselves, to strangers who might find meaning in our words? The title poem serves as both question and answer, suggesting that discovery itself-the ongoing revelation of what needs saying-is perhaps life's most enduring gift.
This is poetry born from the understanding that even in life's final chapters, especially then, we continue to uncover truths worth sharing. Each poem serves as a clue to how we might live and speak with depth when time becomes precious and every word must count.
More details
Language
English
Product notice
Paperback (trade)
Unsewn / adhesive bound
Dimensions
Height: 229 mm
Width: 152 mm
Thickness: 7 mm
Weight
228 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-961451-12-4 (9781961451124)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Person
Wally Swist's Huang Po and the Dimensions of Love (Southern Illinois University Press, 2012) was selected by Yusef Komunyakaa as co-winner in the 2011 Crab Orchard Series Open Poetry Contest. He was the 2018 winner of the Ex Ophidia Press Poetry Prize, by unanimous judging, for his collection A Bird Who Seems to Know Me: Poetry Regarding Birds and Nature (2019). Recent books include Awakening and Visitation (2020), Evanescence: Selected Poems (2020), and Taking Residence (2021), all with Shanti Arts. His books of nonfiction include Singing for Nothing: Selected Nonfiction as Literary Memoir (Brooklyn, NY: The Operating System, 2018), On Beauty: Essays, Reviews, Fiction, and Plays (New York & Lisbon: Adelaide Books, 2018), and A Writer's Statements on Beauty: New and Selected Essays and Reviews (Brunswick, ME: Shanti Arts, 2022). His translation of L'Allegria by Giuseppe Ungaretti was published by Shanti Arts in 2023. Swist is a recipient of Artist's Fellowships in poetry from the Connecticut Commission on the Arts (1977 and 2003). His essays, poetry, and translations have appeared in Asymptote (Taiwan), Chicago Quarterly Review, Commonweal, Ezra: An Online Journal of Translation, Healing Muse, Hunger Mountain, La Piccioletta Barca (U.K.), The Montreal Review, Other Journal, Poetry London, Today's American Catholic, Transference: A Literary Journal Featuring the Art & Process of Translation, (Western Michigan Department of Languages), Vox Populi, and Your Impossible Voice. His book, Aperture, poems regarding caregiving his spouse through Alzheimer's, was published in 2025 by Kelsay Books.