At the End of Day

by Tim Applegate

52 pages, Paperback

First published August 28, 2007

About the author

Tim Applegate was born in Fort Benning, Georgia and grew up in Terre Haute, Indiana. In 1978 he obtained a B.A. degree in journalism and literature from Indiana University. Tim has lived in Boston, Sarasota, Florida, and for the last twenty-three years on two acres in the foothills of the coastal range of western Oregon. He is married and has two daughters. He grows wine grapes on his acreage, is an avid hiker, and travels extensively. Tim's poetry, essays, and short fiction have been published in The Florida Review, The South Dakota Review, Lake Effect, and many other literary journals. He is the author of the poetry collections At the End of Day (Traprock Books) and Blueprints (Turnstone Books of Oregon), the chapbook Drydock (and other poems) (Blue Cubicle Press), and the novels Fever Tree (Amberjack Publishing) and Flamingo Lane (forthcoming from Amberjack Publishing December 2018).

Reviews

[Jean]

The author's life and interests pour out into poetry: family, art, mortality, work, photography, and love. He has an eye for the visual, as seen in his fascination with art and photography. And his words conjure the visual and colorful, leaving imprints on my mind. One of my favorite poems in this book is "Impression, Sunrise 1872," an interpretation of a Monet painting, one I could easily recall. Another favorite is "The Lamp," with its warmth of remembered moments of home, shared with a brother and mother. Other favorites reveal moments of clarity in the simple, fleeting, and ordinary.

Richard Laycock's beautiful drawing "Still Waters" on the cover is perfect for the theme and moods of this book.

[Sue]

These poems, Applegate’s first collection, are like a sip of spring water on a hot day, clear and refreshing. Applegate has a gift for distilling a moment to its essence, for choosing one precise image that conveys more than a hundred could. For example: “Battered tin cup/left on a fence post/measures the winter rain.” Another: …and the old poets bent over their notebooks/while steady rain dripped from the branches/and the river’s ancient water/rushed over/its bed of white stones.” He writes of labor and nature, history and art, each poem a gem. Some of the poems in this collection also appear in Applegate’s chapbook “Drydock,” which focuses on the lives of working men.

[Richard Moss]

"At The End of Day" is an exploration of experiences, observations, insights, and the routines of daily life and work, with the elegant touch of a highly creative and original poet. I strongly recommend this volume.

[John Orman]

I attended a talk by Oregon poet Tim Applegate a few months ago, so thought I would take a look at one of his books of poetry.

The book covers many themes of work and play, health and illness. The poems about loss and mortality were the most touching to me.

"Photographing the Pond" was the most interesting poem for me--the nature of taking a photo, waiting for the light, transience of nature and timelessness of photos.