In Nature's Image

This book is amazing. I started to glance at it on the plane before diving into my novel, and ended up spending the whole trip looking at it. Each page was a delight -- both the picture and the poem just made me smile. I am keeping it in a special place with one other book that I go to when I'm depressed or discouraged, it never fails to lift my spirit.

This hybrid collection of photography and poetry is nothing short of stunning. As the title suggests, the focus of the images is the natural world, crystallizing moments of both intense drama (skies fissured by lightning, nebulas birthing planets) and dreamy quietude (a cat basking in a sunbeam, a blossom pearled with rain) with equal artistry.  The accompanying poems give voice to the awe and wonder that these transcendent vistas inspire; they are poems of gratitude and affirmation, ecstasy and reverence; they are paeans to the beauty of the world and of ourselves, inheritors of the great tradition of joy-drenched poets like Walt Whitman and Mary Oliver. If you are looking for a book to uplift you in these dark times, "a way to reach out and touch the great mystery of being alive," treat yourself to a copy of In Nature's Image. You will not be disappointed.