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Mar 16, 2009

Brittany rated it:

Billy Collins does it again. His most recent collection of poems hits it out of the ballpark. Collins is witty and sardonic, he takes the mundane and transforms it into extraordinary. After reading his poems, I often find myself wanting to examine the inner recesses of his brain so that I can see the world at the angle he does.
In my humble opinion, Billy Collins is one of the great poets of our time. I confirmed this a few years back when Daniel and I had the absolute pleasure of hearing More...

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Jun 02, 2010

Alana rated it:

In Ballistics, the reader will happily find the Billy Collins of his or her previous acquaintance: whimsical, thoughtful, and hauntingly eloquent. As a collection, the poems of Ballistics flow together nicely, but then, there's always something so clearly Collins about his work that I imagine this effect could be achieved with any grouping.

While I love poetry, I admit that I'm never quite sure how one should "review" a book of it. I tend to be introduced to poets by oth More...

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Mar 06, 2010

christa rated it:

In college I had a poetry writing professor who was famous by her own right, but the sister of a far more famous writer. Our assignment was to find a collection of poetry, read it, learn a bit about the writer, analyze the work, and then present our findings. I hopped down the street to the neighborhood indie book store, and plopped down on the floor in front of a relatively small poetry section.

One of those artsy fartsy booksellers interrupted me and asked if he could help me find More...

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Jan 01, 2009

Julia rated it:

I enjoyed Collins' book PICNIC, LIGHTNING, but this new one--while having a few strong lines--seems more self-indulgent than usual. There's almost a whining quality to it that bothered me. He's often compared to Frost, since he uses very accessible language and images, but Frost saw the "bigger picture" within and behind the world. Collins knows the "big picture"--the flow of time, life, death--but he constantly filters it through a personal lens clouded with his own fear, sa More...

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Sep 20, 2011

Jonathan rated it:

Billy Collin’s work does not carry the stereotypical connotation of contemporary poetry. Instead Collins takes simple everyday circumstances and thoughts, he then writes about them in a romantic caring context. Collins’ tone and language is eloquent yet down to earth, he carries the attitude of a mature soul. His poems contain unique imagery in the way that they are not confusing but captivating. His works do not contain techniques like crazy spacing, but he does he tools such as enjambment in a More...

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Jun 21, 2010

Shannon rated it:

I'm not sure if I liked this collection less than previous ones because Collins' style has become somewhat predictable for me, or if these poems really do lack the oomph of his earlier work. If this were the first book of his I had read, I might have been more startled by his word-play, his punchlines, and his easy grace with descriptions of everyday life. But I've read every book he's published, including his early Video Poems, and I'd like to see him push in a new direction rather than writing More...

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Jan 29, 2012

Levi rated it:

It's clear why Billy Collins is comfortable wearing the helm of the common man's poet. He toes that line between sly and weighty, clever and conversational. A lot in Ballistics is a bit reflexive, with many poems inspired by books or paintings or anything else an aging man can see from his desk. He does death well ("The First Night," "The Mortal Coil") and he makes poems like "A Dog on His Master" touching without being goofy. As expected, he can't stay away from th More...

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Sep 13, 2008

David rated it:

Once again Billy Collins delivers a book of poetry that is made for a glass of wine and comfortable chair. I read cover to cover first day i bought it. I dog-eared about every third page, because they are so good you want to read them again. Damn guy is talented.

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Jan 18, 2010

Scott rated it:

As with any poetry collection there are hits and there are misses. With "Ballistics", I think most of these poems hit the mark. One reviewer observed that these poems tend to be a little overly self-indulgent for Billy - but I happen to think that most poetry is self-indulgent. Many of these poems are very philosophical and deeply personal with the usual dose of dry wit one comes to expect from Collins.

One of the main reasons I like Billy Collins (apart from the aforementio More...

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Aug 23, 2011

Kasandra rated it:

Not one of my favorites of his thus far. If this were any other poet, admittedly, I'd probably give this a 4 just for the effort and the number of poems I did like, but for Collins, there were too many just so-so poems in here. Fortunately, one of his pieces has inspired me to retort (he actually upset me with what he said, I am still crafting a reply) so this will be the first time a Collins poem has actually gotten me to WRITE something (as opposed to just enjoying his work immensely and then More...

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Dec 12, 2008

Dustin rated it:

Billy Collins continues to add to his impressive body of poetry. His use of language to create several layers that grab the deep thinkers as well as the casual surface-type dwellers make this book hard not to read several times through.

Being a big fan of Mr. Collins, I found it hard not to speed through each poem just to consume it. I like to let each poem soak and ponder the various meanings that get conjured, but also could not wait to get to the next "painting" to see More...

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Mar 18, 2009

Philip rated it:

Billy Collins used to be my hero. And maybe he still is. Maybe I've been tainted by reading some of the other reviews which said he's been recycling himself too much. He's overdone, redundant...

He does use the same symbolism and style often - it is the same death personified in On the Death of a Next-Door Neighbor as in My Number from a previous collection. He still uses a quote or the title of the poem to define it.

Someone on goodreads said he should branch out - tha More...

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Sep 24, 2008

Dave rated it:

As with all of Billy Collins' work, the poems are highly accessible by the "lay" reader while rewarding to the poetry fan who can see them in a different light.

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Sep 05, 2009

Matt rated it:

One cannot help but like the artistry of a collections of poems that can bring tears to your eyes on one page and have you laughing out loud on the next. In those poems that stand out as gems, one gets a sense of the time and pressures that went into the poet's act of condensing to produce the glittering or darkly glowing poem on the page.
I have only one complaint: I did not like the parody of Frank O'Hara's great poem, "The Day Lady Died". I detest parodies generally. I wish Bi More...

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Jul 13, 2009

Anna rated it:

This was an interesting and unusual read for me, since I usually stick to young adult poetry that has very different themes (identity, fitting in, finding love, etc). This book is different and the poems are all over the place but they all seem to be about very ordinary things that are just looked at in more detail. The poems "Tension," "The Early Years," and "Oh, My God!" are all about really simple everyday things but Collins makes you look at them differently, cr More...

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Oct 25, 2011

Luke rated it:

Category: a book of poetry
hmmmmmmmmm
I read this book because I needed to fill up the poetry category, and my sister recommended it to me.
What I liked about it was it had hidden meanings within hidden meanings within hidden meanings. There is no one way to look at this collection of poetry. It seems like it can be interpreted in different ways for different people. The only negative was that there were some bits that I did not understand well enough to interpret a meaning from. More...

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Jan 10, 2009

Kristie rated it:

No modern poet can compare to Billy Collins. My favorites include "This little Piggy Went to the Market" (who hasn't ever contemplated that song??) to "Bathtub Families." Some poems make you think deeply about death, old age and love; others make laugh out loud. It's a collection that won't disappoint.

Here is an example of one of his short poems:

Divorce

Once, two spoons in a bed,
now tined forks

across a granite table
More...

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Jul 19, 2010

Carre rated it:

Billy Collins' latest collection is officially my favorite--usurping even the beloved The Art of Drowning. It's both funnier and deeper than his previous collections: My husband and I laugh out loud nearly every time we read one of these poems, and each one of them seems to have layers of depth and subtlety that surpass his earlier work. He's also more self-revelatory this time around and frankly, although he's my favorite poet, I've always felt that he hides himself in what he writes, so this i More...

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Jan 07, 2009

Shelah rated it:

Is it cheating to close out the year with a 100-page book of poems? I hope not. Eddie and I have loved Billy Collins's poems for the last decade, and I was excited that a new volume came out just in time for Christmas. Sure, there are some misses, but definitely enough hits to make it worth the sticker price. In fact, since joining the Segullah staff, I feel like it's my civic duty to buy more works of poetry, especially good poetry (I'm not sure that my poet friends would consider Collins good More...

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Jan 21, 2011

Alissa rated it:

I admit it, I don't always understand poetry. So all reviews about poetry should be taken with a grain of salt. I like Shel Silverstein. I like Dr. Suess. I'm not what you'd call a mature reader.

That aside, I'd say I loved about 20% of the pieces in this book and enjoyed about 70%.

Billy Collins has some fabulous lines in his pieces. Beautifully constructed sentences or phrases or pairs. But I can't always feel the cohesion in the entire piece. I prefer the shorter pieces in t More...

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Jan 02, 2012

Grant rated it:

I had to read some Collins for a school poetry project and fell absolutely in love with his poetry. This collection provides a great variety of poems focusing on youth, aging, and society in general, and Collins brings a humorous touch to the poems. Collins's poetry is both valuable in the first level of reading and the more in-depth reading of poetry, as Collins develops insightful messages behind the surface of the poems.

Collins's poetry saved my interest in poetry, for before rea More...

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Nov 19, 2011

Skylar rated it:

I don’t usually like poetry about poetry, but many of my favorite poems in this collection were on precisely that topic, among them “The Great American Poem” and “The Effort.” Billy Collins has much to say about writing, poetry, and language, but even more to say about love, both its sweet and bitter sides. The poem that moved me most deeply was “The Breather.” While there were certainly a number of poems in the collection that did little or nothing for me, I marked several for future repeat r More...

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May 06, 2010

Craig rated it:

I really don't know what to say about this one. While I have really liked collins' work in the past, this collection fell a little flat for me. I was put off a bit by the extremely strong ego that came through in this collection. He attacks other poets' work several times which I found ironic as so many poems in this collection seemed to really miss the mark for me. There are several fantastic stand-out poems, but overall, this collection just felt like the poet going through the motions a bit t More...

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Aug 03, 2011

Alex rated it:

I'm not a huge poetry fan. I liked 2pac's poetry when I was in high school. And that was about it, until I discovered Bukowski. Bukowski is my favorite poet because I enjoy the realism he writes with. A poem about getting drunk and going to the horse track is just about getting drunk and going to the horse track, and yet he can convey that mundane experience in a way that seems tragic and yet beautiful. He is the best author I've ever read at writing about suffering; the despair and desperation More...

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Aug 12, 2010

James rated it:

I don't remember Billy Collins showing a dark side. But Ballistics does throw a shadow. I'd guess he's experienced a personal setback. More than one poem here concerns death, one is entitled "Separation," and it's followed by "Despair" and "The Mortal Coil." But I've always thought his poetry a pleasure to read because of his wry perspectives and quirky humor. That's here, too, and those poems are among my favorites. In fact, the mood does brighten at the end More...

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Oct 21, 2008

Ted rated it:

Billy Collins writes poems that are literate, elegant, artfully crafted, and utterly coherent in the point he wants to get across , the feeling he want to evoke, the irony he wants to convey, and his ability to achieve all this in successive books in equally successive poems is both the attraction to his writing and what bores me silly. His new book, "Ballistics", is the writing of someone who wants to take the starch out of the image of poets and their writing being difficult, obscure More...

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Aug 26, 2009

Mozart rated it:

Billy Collins isn't trying to impress, per say. He is just writing poems. He is writing poems in such a straight forward manner that at first you may not believe that this simple literary object your staring at is truly a poem...it is. Be at ease. Collins' lets you put yourr guard down as a reader and you can just read without analyzing too hard. It will come. His best poems are the ones where he talks about poetry. There doesn't seem to be any theme to the book, but its seperated into sections More...

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Jan 13, 2012

Bryce rated it:

There's a lot to this collection; more slow musings than profound notes on life. I don't feel the punctuation of every poem's end line...the snark, while present and accounted for, is more muted. A few of these gems will reach out like an old friend and pat you on the shoulders, maybe even make you laugh the way most readers of Billy Collins' work are used to. But "Ballistics" is also a collection that seems to dote on the more somber things. It's written by a man who, I assume at More...

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Feb 27, 2010

Linda rated it:

I love Billy Collins. But I have to say that this is my least favorite of his collections. That's not to say that some of the poems were not wonderful and memorable: The Great American Poem, What Love Does, and the very spare but powerful Divorce -- which appear all in a row -- wowed me.

But the poems in the first section felt like something was missing. But I don’t know if anyone else was feeling that. Maybe that was just me.
Maybe that’s just the way I read it.

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Nov 01, 2009

Jason rated it:

Reading a Billy Collins poem is much
like eating a banana--unwrapping wisdom
hidden behind the husk of the everyday,

slow bite after slow bite until
the only thing left to do is throw
the skin away, your hunger for truth

assuaged but not completely satisfied.

*I really enjoyed a few of the poems in this collection, but found most of them lackluster. The $24.00 price tag for 55 poems is rather steep too. Wait for the paperback or buy this collection used

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