The Ways of Being: Poems

by Leslie Howard

”This WAYS OF BEING is the first one hundred poems (all narrative sonnets) the first volume of a planned series, all in Iambic Pentameter. While epochal in scope each one, each sonnet capable of standing on its own. But what is the main topic of The Ways of Being? Maybe it is about gods and rituals – Valhalla and Karma? Or maybe it really about evolution – dinosaurs, all those exciting and intriguing ancients. Many referring to creatures – large and small, good and scary, living in the air, the sea and on land from the tropics to the arctic. Plants, our flora also add to the mix – from rosehips to fairy slippers. Rivers, streams and mountains are not forgotten. Mr. Howard having read in scientific literature, in many disciplines, including the works of Shakespeare. Is this really a Nature Poem? No, it presents a unified and unique philosophy of existence. As we read along, the momentum builds, and we start to understand what Mr. Howard is revealing. It is a hopeful and powerful world view which is particularly welcome in this time of covid despair.” - Ms. Frances Dahlberg Ph.D. Editor of the Anthology, ‘WOMEN THE GATHERER’ 1981.
Mr. Howard, a former garbage worker, dishwasher, laborer, factory worker, truck driver, professional ski patrolmen, hitchhiker, Coast Guardsmen, civil rights & anti-war protester, framing carpenter, New York City taxi driver, trade-union explosive detonator, hospital operating room technician, EMT, attorney’s process server, prison counselor, psychotherapist, rock & ice climber, hospital emergency room mental health evaluator, world traveler, probate court investigator, fly fishermen, and now a poet living in Denver Colorado.

130 pages, Paperback

Published December 10, 2021

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name. ^

Leslie Howard (3 April 1893 – 1 June 1943) was an English stage and film actor, director, and producer. Probably best remembered for playing Ashley Wilkes in Gone with the Wind (1939), he also appeared in Berkeley Square (1933), Of Human Bondage (1934), The Scarlet Pimpernel (1934), The Petrified Forest (1936), Pygmalion (1938), Intermezzo (1939), "Pimpernel" Smith (1941) and The First of the Few (1942).

Howard's Second World War activities included acting and filmmaking. He was active in anti-German propaganda and reputedly involved with British or Allied Intelligence, which may have led to his death in 1943 when an airliner on which he was a passenger was shot down over the Bay of Biscay, sparking conspiracy theories regarding his death.

Howard did not publish an autobiography, although a compilation of his writings, Trivial Fond Records, edited and with occasional comments by his son Ronald, was published in 1982. This book includes insights on his family life, first impressions of America and Americans when he first moved to the United States to act on Broadway, and his views on democracy in the years prior to and during the Second World War.