Charming Gardeners

The formally nuanced and wise epistolary poems in David Biespiel’s new collection are grounded in friendship, camaraderie, and the vulnerability and boldness that defines America.

Roving from the old Confederacy of Biespiel's native South to Portland, Oregon, Charming Gardeners explores the wildness of the Northwest, the avenues of Washington, D.C., the coal fields of West Virginia, and an endless stretch of airplanes and hotel rooms from New York to Texas to California.

These poems explore the “insistent murmurs” of memory and the emotional connections between individuals and history, as well as the bonds of brotherhood, the ghosts of America’s wars, and the vibrancy of love, sex, and intimacy. We are offered poems addressed to family, friends, poets, and political rivals — all in a masterful idiom Robert Pinsky has called Biespiel’s “own original grand style.”



I should stop back there

And stand on both feet in the grazing sunlight

And hear this chorus of America singing.

But I am so afraid of the testament of the delivered.

from “TO __________ FROM THE JEWISH CEMETERY IN WILLIAMSON, WEST VIRGINIA

David Biespiel is the author of four collections of poetry, including Wild Civility and The Book of Men and Women. He also contributed to Politico from 2008 to 2012.

To from the Jewish Cemetery in Williamson, West Virginia

To Wendy from Yellow Hickory

To Plumly from Lummi Island

To Hugo from SoDo

To Biespiel from Schul

To Wiman from Walla Walla

To Keller from Skamania Lodge

To Ruest from Winston-Salem

To Gifford from Kiowa County

To Bierds from the Cannery Pier Hotel

To Ansel from the Hotel Andra

To Di Piero from Dufur

To Farnsworth from Bar Avignon

To Collier from United Flight 304

To Buckley from Berkeley

To Conda from Anaconda

To Wendy from the Gershwin Hotel

To Smith from Northampton

To Snyder from the Blue Scorcher Café

To Sylvester from Terminal B

To Gifford from United Flight 308

To C. D. from D.C.

To Unrau from Union

To Lenney from the Greenbrier Hotel

To Biespiel from United Flight 1037

To Luke from United Flight 251

To Wendy from the Crow’s Nest

Postscript

Acknowledgments

About the Author