Pink Dust - by Ron Padgett (Paperback)

About the Book

"A wry, poignant reflection on aging from one of America's finest and most admired poets. Admired by such luminaries as indie film director Jim Jarmusch and punk rock godfather Richard Hell, Pulitzer Prize finalist Ron Padgett is one of our best known and most acclaimed poets. For the last six decades, Padgett's poetry-"wonderful, generous, funny" (John Ashbery)-has moved and delighted generations of readers with its inventiveness, its gentle humor, and above all, its ability to instil wonder. Padgett brings these same qualities to his new book of poems, Pink Dust, a poignant reflection on old age that shimmers with all the insouciance of youth"--

Book Synopsis

Ron Padgett is one of America's best-known and most acclaimed poets. Admired by John Ashbery, Jim Jarmusch, and Anne Waldman, his poems have moved and delighted generations of readers with their inventiveness, their gentle humor, and above all their ability to elicit wonder. These qualities are as evident as ever in Pink Dust, whose title refers to the residue from all the author's erasers, swept away or blown into the air. Like that dust, this is a book of memories rubbing up against the present. Its poignant reflections on old age shimmer with all the insouciance of youth.

Review Quotes

"Wonderful, generous, funny poetry." --John Ashbery

"Reading Padgett one realizes that playfulness and lightness of touch are not at odds with seriousness.... As is often the case, leave it to the comic writer to best convey our tragic predicament." --Charles Simic

"[Padgett's] poetry is masterful for its panoramic humanity and mind-stopping verbal wit, its breathtaking power and beauty. We want to stay with the person in these poems all day long." --Anne Waldman

"Pink Dust is full of optimism and piercing humour...As always, Padgett's sombre subjects are leavened with his trademark aversion to sanctimony and pretension; or, what one poem defines as our contemporary culture's 'small, sad pleasure / of being right'." --Tim Keane, The Telegraph

"Pink Dust contains an ethical heart, a conviction of purpose filtered through these oddly contemplative jokes and musings. Within the jewel-boxes of these poems there is a strengthening liquor -- some kindness, humor, and devotion that I certainly needed." --Magda Andrews-Hoke, On the Seawall

About the Author

Ron Padgett is a poet whose many honors include the American Academy of Arts and Letters poetry award, the Shelley Memorial Award, and the Frost Medal for distinguished lifetime achievement from the Poetry Society of America. In addition to his memoirs of Joe Brainard, Dick Gallup, and Ted Berrigan, he has published book-length translations of the poetry of Apollinaire, Reverdy, and Cendrars. Padgett lives in New York City.