Synopses & Reviews
With provocative insights on every page and a new language for the heady, raw experience of being alive, these poems focus their gaze on the existential dilemma of how one finds meaning in a fallen world. The poems locate themselves in the detritus of modern consumer life, finding redemption and spiritual sustenance in a landscape beyond words. The work offers hope while stripping away the world's disguises, revealing the stable, comforting, and agreeable ground of living in the present moment.
Review
“What a delight to read a poet who reminds us that 'You can / get what you want, but it’s silly,' and yet then goes on to give us not only what we want, but what we need: cunningly crafted poems." —David J. Rothman, author, Living the Life
Review
“J Diego Frey is to poetry what Robert Manko is to New Yorker cartoons: dotted and humane, with a short reach to the absurd.” —Scott Sawyer, author, Earthly Fathers
Synopsis
This is a gripping story that begins in February 2022, when the author and his family shared the fate of millions of Ukrainian refugees driven out of their cities and villages by the Russian invasion. Over a year later, the intense panic of the first weeks and months has subsided, and the author is able to convey the story through a clearer lens. This is not a hate-filled recounting of their experiences--despite ongoing attacks. Instead, it focuses on the moments of love, friendship, unity, courage, and faith that Ukrainians experienced since the onset of the war. While war can be experienced as an out-of-control fire, it can also bring forward the healing warmth of kinship.
About the Author
"The Year the Eggs Cracked" is the second poetry collection by J Diego Frey. As with his first collection, "Umbrellas or Else", this books title was suggested by his father many years ago on one of many long walks along the Cherry Creek bike path that passed for entertainment in that distant country of the poets 1970s Denver childhood. When not writing poems, Frey sometimes teaches the writing of poems at Lighthouse Writers Workshop. He enjoys a well-made cheeseburger.