Rain on the River: Selected Poems and Short Prose

A collection of chapbooks, musings, poetry, and short prose by folklorist Jim Dodge, described by Publishers Weekly as having a "wonderful imagination, eye for detail and command of language." While Dodge is known internationally for his fiction, poetry is his primary passion. For eighteen years he published anonymously, reading only to local audiences in the Pacific Northwest. He then began issuing occasional limited-edition letterpress chapbooks, broadsides, and Winter Solstice poems or stories since 1987, mostly given as gifts to friends. Rain on the River collects his work for the first time, including three dozen previously unpublished poems. Dodge's verse and short prose feature a strong command of language, emotional range and subtlety, attention to illuminating detail, and a sensibility that blends humor, wit, and tenderness. His writing is marked by clarity and grace. According to Sacramento News & Review, his work demonstrates that "money and food and poetry [are] ways to live, not reasons."