Responses to

This is a second poetry book of its kind. Will this become a new poetry genre? Who knows. The first poetry book of this genre was Dr John WorldPeace JD response to "frank:sonnets by Diane Seuss" that won the 2022 Pulitzer Poetry Prize.

This particular book began with my reading of Stanyan Steet & Other Sorrows by Rod McKuen looking for outstanding phrases and lines; outstanding in that they were to me a heart of the poem. Outstanding in that they stood out from all the other phrases on a particular page.

I took these phrases and for the most part leaving them as written by Mr. McKuen, I constructed a new poem around them.

That poem was not generally a response, or commentary, or critique but for lack of a better defining word I have titled my book a response.

I have put at the top of each of my poems the page number from Mr. McKuen's book where I found the stellar phrase. I did not set off in bold or italics font the phrase from Mr McKuen book in my poem. If anyone wants to know what the phrase is they will have to acquire a copy of Mr. McKuen's book and ferret it out.

I do write poems in the generic sense of pen and paper but I do not write poems in the sense of creating them in a traditional way. I have channeled all my 8,000+ poems from 1970 to present.

By channeling a poem I mean the following. Something catches my attention and it morphs into a phrase. When the phrases came into my consciousness I know I have the heart of a poem.

I immediately stop what I was doing and hold the phrase in my mind until I had someway to record it. I will not allow myself to mentally follow the phrase as it became a poem. If I did that, I would lose the poem. So if I allowed 3 lines to play out in my mind as I began the fourth line I would begin to lose the first line.

I have written poems about everything.

If you look at all my poems and lay them chronologically next to my auto-biography you will see what I was thinking at a point of time in my life. They are all dated and timed. Almost all my poems have an emotional aspect no matter how subtle.

I am a high IQ high energy polymath. Everything interests me.

I am 74 years old and I have many many life experiences.

I never read poetry and did not publish my poetry until 2018 after writing for 48 years. I was just too busy with other things.

I did read a lot of religious and spiritual books and at some point I developed an interest in Zen and haiku and Zen koans. I like the multidimensional aspect of haiku and I have written hundreds of poems in the haiku 5-7-5 format. But I do not enjoy forcing poems into any kind of structure.

I was never a part of and still am not a part of any poetry community. I am not a joiner or participant in groups of any kind and generally never have been.

As a result of my lifestyle I have many life experiences and just about everything I read or observe has the potential to manifest a poem to be channeled.

Most people to me are one trick ponies. They have one vocation. I have had a dozen, insurance, accounting, tax, law, web design, poetry, art, the American Civil War, Nazi Germany, science, soldiering, etc.
I have been officially married twice for 19 years each, four children with the first wife, ran for political office, was a political prisoner, etc.

This is the reservoir of my poetry. Dr John WorldPeace JD