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In Wise Poison David Rivard gives us a mind hard at work on the most vital questions:Who am I? What do I love? What can be trusted? At issue in these passionate arguments with the self are the "curious forces" that surround us in every part of our lives. In an airport lounge in the Yucatán, in the song of a street musician, or simply in the pulsing of skin along the neck, Rivard finds connections and doubt, and reason for both comfort and rage.
Amazon.com Review
David Rivard writes the story of reality construction in hispoems. What it means to be afraid, or defiant, or amazed lies in somecombination of happenstance and the story we tell ourselves about whowe are, he seems to be saying. Consider, as a case in point, "AnyWhere Out of the World," in which Rivard describes sweatingthrough a shirt so that the red dye stains his skin at the very momenthe first learns of the Jonestown massacre. He writes: "I found mychest & arms tinted / a translucently purplish red / paper towels andliquid soap couldn't scrub off-- / so that the words ... seemed thento have made my body / glow ..." The circumstance of hearing thenews at that time alters the experience's meaning. For Rivard, thedisaster, born of madness and faith, becomes the story of all humanloss and suffering. ... Read more

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Creations of a Brewing Boiling Mind
Reading David Rivard's extraordinarily well written poems makes a believer out of even the most dubious surveyor of poets. In this riveting collection of observations, thoughts on mortality and meaning, and expectations confronting realities Rivard says more in a brief space than most poets today. His language, while amazing, cuts razor deep into our comfortable world and gives cause to look again after spending time with these pages.

Sometimes his poems are terse: 'Some day it is my one wish to live/alone, nameless, unfathomable,/ a drifter or unemployed alien.' Or in 'Against Recovery' where he recalls his assumptions of the city of Los Angeles being a paradise of beaches and pleasures, but finding it afterall to be a insubtantial hollow and used city of plastic (I wish I could quote from this delicious poem but Amazon.com excludes extended quotes) they are extended reveries on drifting imaginings. How powerful his delineation between dream and reality!

Rivard is a poet who demands attention, not only while digesting his pungent thoughts, but when evaluating the contemporary echelon of fine poets. He certainly has arrived there. Recommended. Grady Harp, February 06
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A kind of "public dreaming" takes place via the music of these poems--a music as likely to visit the long-dead ghosts of the Kwakiutl tribe as Gianni Versace, and as interested in the baby seat of a car as it is in a boxing ring. Building on the critical success of David Rivard's two earlier, award-winning books, Bewitched Playground widens both his emotional aperture and formal range. Rivard calls it "my book of domestic voodoo"--not a book about having a child, but written out of a life touched by a new intimacy, and tuned-in to an unwilled strangeness, a fluctuating gravity.

Here, the unconscious forces of the imagination intersect with the everyday, in a crossroads at the bewitched playground. These stylistically innovative poems are full of the rediscovery that the world teems with "otherness," with freshness and surprise.
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Stylistically innovative poetry.
In David Rivard's poetry, the unconscious forces of the imagination intersect with life's everyday details. His stylistically innovative poems reflect the discovery that the world teems with "otherness",freshness, and surprise. Lucky Slaves: In the city, meanwhile,/the tenantscome home,/the subletters & co-op owners,/dwellers beneath/slatemansard roofs & heating ducts,/they arrive one/by one, that being theirway,/one by hopeless/unimportant/hopeful one -- slaves --/but luckslaves,/like the last of those last few Israelites,/they who wanderedsighing & distracted/over a path/the Lord of the parted Red Sea hadmade./Soon the suppers/of America/will start to be prepared./First theparing of onions,/and then the frying./On the forehead of the city thesun/is setting, the brow/in flames, the brain doing a cool/coppery burn.But the floor/beneath our feet remains/firm. It will not/be turned/to ash.

welcome to the playground
I have always admired David Rivard's way of looking at the world around him as a way of illuminating the "big questions" like who are we and where are we going. He observes life from a different angle, noticingthe small gestures and odd moments that make us human.In BewitchedPlayground Rivard's insights are there, but I was also struck by the heartin these new poems. Rivard writes of a daughter being born and I can onlywonder if that event has helped shape the playfulness of some of thesepoems. His observations are keen and the voice of these poems is that ofsomeone about to tell you a great story ... Read more

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Purchase includes free access to book updates online and a free trial membership in the publisher's book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge. Chapters: Robin Hemley, David Wojahn, Jean Valentine, David Rivard, Mary Ruefle, Jody Gladding, Betsy Sholl, Leslie Ullman, Douglas Glover, Ralph Angel, William Olsen, Nancy Eimers, Natasha Sajé, Xu Xi. Excerpt:Elizabeth "Betsy" Sholl is an American poet and the current poet laureate of Maine . She was appointed by Governor John Baldacci to the position in 2006 and will hold it until 2011. She is the author of seven collections of poetry, most recently, Rough Cradle (Alice James Books , 2009). Her poetry has been published in numerous journals and magazines including Orion Magazine, Field, Triquarterly, The Kenyon Review, The Massachusetts Review, Ploughshares, and Beloit Poetry Journal. She has been awarded fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Maine Arts Commission. She was one of the seven founding members of Alice James Books, and teaches at the University of Southern Maine and in the low-residency MFA program at the Vermont College of Fine Arts . She has been a visiting poet at the University of Pittsburgh and at Bucknell University. She grew up in Brick Town, New Jersey, and has an MFA in poetry writing from Vermont College as well as an M.A. from the University of Rochester and a BA in English Literature from Bucknell University . She lives in Portland, Maine, with her husband. She and her husband, Doug Sholl, moved to Maine in 1983 after stints in Boston and Big Stone Gap, Virginia. Published Works Full-length Poetry Collections Chapbooks Anthologies References (URLs online) Websites (URLs online) A hyperlinked version of this chapter is at David Rivard (b. 1953, Fall River, Massachusetts ) is an American poet. His poems and essays have appeared in numerous literary magazines, including New England R... ... Read more

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This digital document, covering the life and work of David Rivard, is an entry from Contemporary Authors, a reference volume published by Thomson Gale. The length of the entry is 574 words. The page length listed above is based on a typical 300-word page. Although the exact content of each entry from this volume can vary, typical entries include the following information:

• Place and date of birth and death (if deceased)
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• A description of the author's work
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Guiding us through the ancient wisdom of the I Ching, A Hymn of Changes provides elemental context, as well as personal direction, for accessing the deeper pathways made evident through this ancient diviniation modality... the gift of confirmation from your own insight and wisdom of a more than 3000 year old sage before you. ... Read more

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This digital document is an article from Journal of Drugs in Dermatology, published by Thomson Gale on June 1, 2006. The length of the article is 4346 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Henry Ford Hospital dermatology experience with Levulan Kerastick and blue light photodynamic therapy.(CASE REPORTS)
Author: Jennifer Rivard
Publication: Journal of Drugs in Dermatology (Magazine/Journal)
Date: June 1, 2006
Publisher: Thomson Gale
Volume: 5Issue: 6Page: 556(6)

Distributed by Thomson Gale ... Read more