Now We're Getting Somewhere: Wisconsin Poetry Series

Now We're Getting Somewhere by David Clewell (Volume 1994) (Wisconsin Poetry Series) Publisher: University of Wisconsin Press, 1994 ISBN is 9780299144142 / 0299144143 Paperback 6 x 8 inches, 85 pages David Clewell's graceful, honest lines accumulate and remind us that poems can be as tangible, as substantial, as redemptive as those things the poet will not let go unspoken in the world. His compassionate witness is born out of immersion in doggedly bittersweet particulars: the cockeyed wisdom of 1950s science fiction movies; Do Not Disturb signs; vegetarian physics; the perils of bed-and-breakfast lodging; flying saucer disciples; what to do in case of Rapture; Debbie Fuller, reluctant childhood angel; the theory and practice of Spontaneous Human Combustion. His passionate transformation of that raw data into song no matter how fragile or raucous provides irrefutable testimony about the consequences of being nothing less than human, where every day someone crawls out of his ocean of sleep / and takes those first tottering steps on the planet again, / he's playing with real fire. And with Clewell's insistence on the unlikely grace in that condition, along with the generosity of his unabashed inclusiveness, his poetry is a powerful antidote to the bad medicine we're too often asked to swallow.This is a book of sustenance, of fresh assurances that come to us ready or not out of the blue of this spirited poet's most engaging work yet. ------------------------- David Clewell (February 11, 1955 – February 15, 2020) was an American poet and creative writing instructor at Webster University. From 2010–2012, he served as the Poet Laureate of Missouri. Clewell was born in New Brunswick, New Jersey in 1955 and attended Highland Park High School, in nearby Highland Park, where he first developed an interest in poetry. He graduated from University of Wisconsin with a B.A. in English. In 1979, he moved to St. Louis, Missouri and earned an M.F.A. in writing from Washington University. In 1985, Clewell began teaching in the English Department at Webster University. A year later, he started the Webster University Visiting Writers Series, which he still coordinated until his death. As an instructor at Webster University, Clewell taught courses on 19th- and 20th-century literature, as well as poetry workshops and seminars. In 2010, Missouri Governor Jay Nixon noted that Clewell "has a unique perspective on contemporary American life and the characters and ideas that loom large in our recent history." Clewell is the author of 10 poetry collections and his work has appeared in over 50 journals and magazines, including Harper's, Poetry, The Kenyon Review, The Missouri Review, The Georgia Review, Ontario Review, New Letters, and Yankee. He has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize for poetry seven times. He was the poet laureate for the state of Missouri, serving until 2012. He passed the poetic torch to Will Trowbridge. He lived in Webster Groves, Missouri with his wife Patricia.