The colors of ash

This story-sequenced volume of tanka, cherita, haiku and short-form free verse allows the reader to discover Larry Kimmel's wide range of subject matter, his fine use of language, and more importantly, the way he allows the form to grow through him, delivering to us his personal truths. Kimmel is a writer and a poet I have time for. He brings every echo from his past to enrich our present. I may have created the Cherita, which dominates this collection, but Larry Kimmel has endowed it with endless possibilities here. I hope you will buy and treasure this book and immerse yourself in the poet's fragmented world, a world in which he shows us again and again how we can cope and survive with the permanent ache of being human. - ai li, editor of the cherita__________'the colors of ash' kept me awake most of the night. It is spectacular. I love it. When I did sleep a little I dreamed a man came up the lane and sat on the bank by an old ruin and began to read poems aloud. He said - 'this ruin is the colour of ashes'. Somehow it's where these poems belong, in the countryside, away from traffic or industry and the noise of men and music. They are poems to get lost in, poems that made me forget the passing of time and present troubles. Every poem goes deep and makes me think yes, me too. - Joy McCall, author of FieldGates