Overview

The intersection of land, culture, language and history lie at the foundation of this lyrical free verse chapbook, with themes of reconnecting and mindful awareness driving these carefully collected and arranged words forward. Navigating an internal landscape of memory and emotion fragmented by emotional and neurological dysregulation, the poems return again and again to the earth, to the natural world for comfort and understanding. The sonic register and tone created by mindful word choices move the reader through a collection of imagery vignettes in a search for meaning. By carefully observing the plants, animals and elements of the creation we are all a part of, the anthropocentric ebbs to reveal the wholeness which that allows for. It's not a surrender, it's assuming responsibility for how we move in and view the world around us, and accepting that we are a vital part of that reciprocal relationship. Just as words, and more importantly their sounds, have the power to damage and control, they also have the ability to unlock the traumas locked in our bodies and allow for healing. For everything taken, something must be given back, and for what was taken from the narrator, these poems are 'a gift for the mind, ' as poet James Stevens observes. Read these words aloud, let the light shooting through them invite you to lean in.

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Reviews

"Heliotropic is a collection of poems from the littoral. Bootes' poems originate between the Gulf Coast and the dry inland seas of high desert. Their sound blooms in the poetic ear like seeds from ""the blown apart shattered."" A poet of milkweed, latex glyphs, roadrunners, and settler green tentacles. With a perfect ear, Bootes chooses words that move our sensory boats to the place ""our discordant coastlines migrate."" Heliotropic is a gift for your mind.-James Thomas Stevens, author of The Golden Book and A Bridge Dead in the Water If you've ever held a broken-winged bird that's fallen from its nest, fed it cornmeal mush and nursed it to health. Waited for it to fly, then waited for its return. Listened for its songs of history through wind, where Kentucky blue grass grows, and all the other places it's been. That's what these poems do. Breakneck and tenderly. Forget all your prayers and open your palms.-Karen Vargas, Taos Author"

Author Information

Born in Pewee Valley, Kentucky, Doug Bootes currently lives in New Mexico and teaches at the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe. His work has most recently appeared in Poetry Northwest, On the Run Contemporary Flash Fiction, The New Limestone Review, The Closed Eye Open: Maya's Micros, The Santa Fe Reporter and the futurism anthology Into the Unknown, Together.

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