Twirling in a Beam of Light - by Judy Kirkwood (Paperback)

About the Book

No matter how many dark nights pass, you can fly through the day on a dust mote twirling in a beam of light.

Book Synopsis

This book started in the 1970s when I was a writer of poems, having graduated with a Master's Degree from the Program for Writers at the University of Illinois, Chicago. I don't believe any of the poems in my original Masters manuscript survived, but some of the people depicted in it did, mainly me and my then boyfriend, then husband, then ex, and our friend Paul, who remains a Chicago character even if he lives in Indiana. Marriage is a fragile enterprise. A long one, like mine (35 years) is a history of more than two people. It is places and times, ideas and dreams, families of parents, children, and grandchildren, friends, houses and seasons. Yes, there was an actual balcony, and a pink room, and of course we are all small planets orbiting around each other and the sun, shooting stars and eclipsing our own radiance. Our stories continue with or without us. It wasn't until the poems for "Twirling in a Beam of Light" were in order that I realized the whole was really a memoir of growing from a girl, safe with her parents' voices in the background, to a girlfriend, wife, mom, work career and the transformation that aging offers. These poems are about joy and loss, grief and celebration, seeing oneself in context as the world changes. The message is you can start over and make a home among strangers, you can open the door to a new beginning, and no matter how many dark nights pass, you can fly through the day on a dust mote twirling in a beam of light.

Review Quotes

"Judy Kirkwood's Twirling in a Beam of Light is alive to the nuances of living, an appreciation of everyday nature, eloquent self-examination, autopsies of old relationships and celebrations of new ones. She understands the ebb and flow of joy and grief and the power of love and language to lift one up in times of difficulty. Read this book for its radiance, maturity, and compelling view of what it means to be alive."-Maxine Chernoff, professor emeritus of the Creative Writing program at San Francisco State University an NEA Fellow in poetry, author of 19 poetry collections and 5 works of fiction

"With a quiet, lyrical voice, a wry and affirmative humor, and an affectionate eye for the small turns of daily life, Judy Kirkwood celebrates 'the triumph of stuttering love.'" - Ronald Wallace, Felix Pollak Professor of Poetry Emeritus, University of Wisconsin-Madison and Pitt Poetry Series author

"Twirling in a Beam of Light is a remarkable collection that will not only astound you but stop you in your tracks. Her beautiful words will challenge your own mindful awakenings as you read from poem to poem. From her first entry, which evokes a sense of longing and love, to her last, which circles back to the same, you'll keep reading to learn more about the poet but mostly more about yourself." - Jackie Dishner, writer, artist, and founder of Creative Coping for Women on Facebook

"Judy Kirkwood's stunning collection of poems sweeps us through decades of life, love, and loss among the sounds of her midwestern neighborhood, the tremolo of birds heard from the side of the road, and through the last breaths of a beloved swathed in the thickness of a Florida summer. Her memoir in poetry offers exquisite morsels to the reader yearning for other ways to understand the smorgasbord of life that lays before each of us." - Rachel Dickinson, artist and author of The Loneliest Places: Loss, Grief, and The Long Journey Home

"Judy Kirkwood's poetry memoir, Twirling in a Beam of Light, binds more than fifty years of marriage, children, moves to new locations, divorce, new loves and new losses, with a sense of both the impermanence of certainty and the certainty of the divine. Her poems are threaded with nature and refreshing, idiosyncratic imagery but they are down to earth, accessible and remain ever hopeful. In the last section of the book, 'Florida Epilogue, ' she takes her dog Flip on a big move and literally flips over to a new life full of change, growth, love and tragedy. More will be revealed. This book is about how to live fearlessly with verve, grace, and humility." -Gretchen Brant, Artist, Hopkins, Minnesota