Happy Life
Different Planet
December 31, 2016Little Acts of Kindness
February 17, 2017
HAPPY LIFE
D avid Budbill continues a wry, joyful examination of life on his semi-metaphorical Judevine Mountain, writing about the New England seasons, fame and fortune, self-reliance, aging, and the engaged creative life. Profoundly simple and immediate, Budbill’s poems radiate a dialogue with nature through absolute clarity of expression.
Yet and still every day the sun rises,
white clouds roll across the sky,
vegetables get planted and grow,
and late in the afternoon
someone sits quietly with a cup of tea.
(Copper Canyon Press, 2011)
HAPPY LIFE spent 27 weeks on the Poetry Foundation’s Poetry.org
Best Seller List between July 2011 and January 2012
Review Excerpts for HAPPY LIFE
“His poetry is as accessible as a parking lot and as plain as a pair of Levi’s.”
– Parnassus
“A recognizable immediacy and honesty, accompanied by an endearing wit… Budbill’s economical, brush-stroke approach… evinces a hard-won clarity, a pure, human tone.”
– Library Journal
“One of the most readable American poets ever.”
– Booklist
“David Budbill is a no-nonsense free-range sage.”
– Dana Jennings, The New York Times, 20 December 2011
“. . . warm and accessible poems that grow out of the poet’s experience and his meditations on who he is and how he found himself over the last forty years . . . clear language, his wry, self – effacing humor and his humble recognition of all the poets to whom he owes his poetry. . .”
– Michael Macklin, The Cafe Review, Fall 2011
“The art of ‘Budbill’s poems is created by the absence of any artistic pretense. . . . HAPPY LIFE is a simple pleasure, offered by a master poet.”
– Christina Cook, Northern Woodlands, Winter 2011
“Budbill’s hermit writes in straightforward but poetic language about the paradoxes of being alive. . . . As always, he is funny, pointed even, in a sardonic way. . . . The defining terms of Budbill’s vision [is] the tension between worldly desire and quiet wisdom, the intent to be here now. It requires both self-awareness and a touch of self-deprecation … or, at least, the ability to see yourself plain.”
– David Ulin, Los Angeles Times, 1 August 2011
“The poems are as clear, as crisp and direct as ever . . . Often they are laced with a sharp, self-deprecating wit.”
– Tom Slayton, Vermont Public Radio, 6 October 2011
“In impeccably clear and accessible language: [Budbill] ruminates on the satisfaction he gets from flowing with life’s natural rhythms and living within his means—not only economically, but also artistically and spiritually . . . his poems . . . frequently call into question the demands of contemporary life. Nothing in them seems extraneous . . . —there aren’t any metaphors—and you get the sense that he knows what really matters . . .”
– Shannon Wagner, Ploughshares Literary Magazine, 24 January 2012
“Wiseass, grumpy and soul-nourishing poems.”
– Shelf Awareness, the top of the top ten, 7 December 2011