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Going Out Dancing: Poems
Diagnosed with terminal prostate cancer in February 1999, Ric Masten has survived for nine years and counting. For decades, Masten's unique mix of minstrel ministry and poetic philosophy has challenged and inspired audiences in many settings conferences, colleges, schools, and churches across the country. These poems reveal his humorous, unflinching, and edgy take on mortality and living with illness.
104 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 2008
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
December 30, 2022
At some point on a trip down the California coast when I was much younger than I am now, I picked up a book of Ric Masten's poetry entitled "Who's Wavin'?" I loved that book and still have it. This past year I've been revisiting some of the poets who moved and inspired me back then, and the penny dropped that, hey, they have probably written more books in the meantime. That thought led me to this book, Ric Masten's last before dying of prostate cancer a few years back.
Although the book deals with--among many other things--terminal cancer and resulting depression, this collection is anything but grim. It is full of the author's zest for life and his deceptively plain-spoken musings on what it means to be human. The reader doesn't need any kind of college course in American Poets in order to read Masten, but what *is* needed is heart. The overarching message of this collection seems to be that we are all in this together and what touches one touches all.
I do have one quibble about the layout of this book. Instead of having a new poem on each page or series of pages, they all follow one another pell-mell, one poem starting where the previous poem left off, with just a space and title in between. Because of this, almost all the poems are split up, displayed partly on one page and partly on another. The reader can't take in the entire poem--even the short ones--at a glance. Saving paper (and thereby saving expense) comes at a cost to the attractiveness of the volume and the experience of reading it. That said, Ric Masten seems to me to have finished up the way he started: honest, straightforward, and full of humanity.
Although the book deals with--among many other things--terminal cancer and resulting depression, this collection is anything but grim. It is full of the author's zest for life and his deceptively plain-spoken musings on what it means to be human. The reader doesn't need any kind of college course in American Poets in order to read Masten, but what *is* needed is heart. The overarching message of this collection seems to be that we are all in this together and what touches one touches all.
I do have one quibble about the layout of this book. Instead of having a new poem on each page or series of pages, they all follow one another pell-mell, one poem starting where the previous poem left off, with just a space and title in between. Because of this, almost all the poems are split up, displayed partly on one page and partly on another. The reader can't take in the entire poem--even the short ones--at a glance. Saving paper (and thereby saving expense) comes at a cost to the attractiveness of the volume and the experience of reading it. That said, Ric Masten seems to me to have finished up the way he started: honest, straightforward, and full of humanity.
Displaying 1 of 1 review