MY HEART was first molded a Mainers when I was five and my parents purchased land on Lake Androscoggin in Wayne where they built a summer camp.My father was a minister and, consequently, we always lived in homes that, as I saw it at the time, were loaned to us. But the camp in Wayne was ours. It has always been, and still is, the center of our family s life and the summer gathering point for family members who are spread out all over the eastern seaboard. My wife Ann and I both graduated from Colby College in Waterville,Maine, and after seven years in temporary residence in the mid-west, we returned to Maine to raise our family and to become official residents. That was thirty-three years ago. We bought an old farm in Rumford Center, up toward Andover, that hadn t been lived in for five years, had hay growing right up to the front door, a hole in the back roof, an L and shed and attached barn that went on forever, five outbuildings in various stages of decay.We lived there for thirteen wondrous years, raised two children, a small herd of Black Angus cattle, chickens (and eggs), bees (and honey). We hiked the woods, climbed the cliffs, skied the snowmobile trails that could take us through the wilderness to Canada.We burned eight to ten cords of wood every winter (wood that we cut, split, hauled, and stacked ourselves), swam in the Ellis River all summer, fought the snow drifts every winter day to get out and later to get back in, rose every morning to the sun coming up over the cliff in back of our barn and went to bed every night to the glow of sunsets behind the mountain and cliffs on the other side of the valley. When our slave labor force graduated from high school and went to live their lives as Mainers in other corners of the state, we reluctantly said farewell to the mountains and our farm and now enjoy coastal suburbia in Freeport. We still live in the country, (Maine doesn t really have a suburbia), in an 1830 New England center chimney cape with three fireplaces and a yard that is bordered by woods.We both are past our 60th birthdays, still working (Ann teaches in an elementary school, I teach at the University of Southern Maine), both dealing with health issues that have raised our appreciation of good health. (Ann has an implanted defibrillator; I have Parkinson s.) But we are grateful that we live in such a beautiful place, surrounded by family and the beauty of Maine. One last note of possible interest: I began writing poetry two years ago when I wanted a way to tell Ann how much she meant to me.We have known each other since we were twelve and have been in love since we were seventeen. The poem One Moment, One Lifetime was the first poem I wrote. Having had fun composing it, and finding out that through poetry I can explore and express my feelings, I have been writing ever since. I don t attempt to hide the fact that my poetry is personal stuff, but that is what poetry should be. And, because it s personal is why I begin this collection with a little information about the person who wrote it. I hope that by reading these poems you get to feel a little of the pervasive culture of Maine in which human beings find rejuvenation, inspiration, connection and strength from the mountains and forests and waters of this beautiful corner or our country.

Searching for the Spring: Poetic Reflections of Maine

Literature & Fiction

Ken Nye

Poetry

Tjmf Pub.

The poems in this book could be characterized simply as vignettes of life, but I hope that the reader sees more in these poems, recognizes the myriad ways that love, the creative spirit that permeates our world and the universe beyond, and our own eagerness for and commitment to relationships that nourish and sustain us and frame our lives, weave together this world of wonder and mystery with which we have been gifted.

From the Heart: Poetic Reflections on Growing Old in Maine

TJMF Publishing

This book is dedicated to the dogs that have filled my life, from boyhood to the present, with companionship and affection and laughter. To: BONNIE, a black cocker spaniel, the dog of my childhood. She joined our family when I was two. She died when I was 18. I wasn t with her when she was put down. I should have been. TAFFY, a labcollie mix, Ann s and my first family dog, the best Frisbee player I have ever known. She loved to get in under the covers with me when Ann wasn t looking. MISSY, our stepdog, a gentle and loveable golden retriever who celebrated my return to the house in the afternoon by presenting me with a stone dug up from the driveway. (In the thirteen years we lived on the farm, Missy moved our entire driveway ten feet.) TESSY, our first golden puppy, my farm and woods wandering companion, the first dog I trained, a special dog to me. GRACIE, a tiny blond cocker spaniel waif, rebuffed by her mom and rescued by my sister who fed her day and night for weeks with an eye dropper and spoon to keep her alive, blind in one eye, always grateful for our attention. ROSIE, a spunky blond cocker spaniel who, when we got a golden puppy (Barney), enjoyed bossing him around because she was bigger than he was, but who, when he had grown to be four times her size, could never figure out why he didn t do what she wanted him to. BARNEY, a great big golden, the only male dog I have ever raised, with a heart as big as his head and a love of people that knew no limits. He was a joy. I still miss him. ELLIE AND FRANKIE, our two abandoned golden retriever/ yellow lab mixed breeds who rescued me from grief, and who reminded me every day of the joy and affection that dogs bring into our lives. COZY, our new baby golden retriever (now two years old) who is everything a dog person could ask for in a dog: a sweet, obedient, snugglebunny who delights in chewing on Frankie s collar and neck, probably the last puppy I will ever have.

A Dog is a Gift: A poetic celebration of living with a dog

This is a book about a poet's life in his beloved state of Maine. A fourth book, Ken uses his natural ability to write along with an incredible eye for beauty of all kinds; a love of nature, his fellow man, family and words.  In Ken's own words he describes his thougts behind his writing and this book. A TRIBUTE William Wordsworth, the great early 19th century British poet and co-founder, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, of the Romantic Movement in British literature, has been a significant influence in my life. I first met Wordsworth when I was a senior in high school. Miss Sylvia Kurzon was our senior English teacher who required us to memorize a number of things, many of which I was too young and inexperienced then to appreciate. One of the things we had to memorize was a passage (copied below) from Wordsworth s great Ode on Intimations of Immortality. Over the years that passage stuck in my head, and as I matured into an adult and began to piece together a conception of the world and the universe and my role in it all, Wordsworth s explanation became the framework for my personal and theological philosophy. And no other poet has influenced my own poetic style more than Wordsworth who used vivid imagery from the natural world with which he demonstrated and explained his conception of how the universe worked. To his spirit I will always be grateful. Our birth is but a sleep And a forgetting. The soul that rises with us, our life star, Hath had elsewhere it s setting, And cometh from afar; Not in entire forgetfulness, And not in utter nakedness, But trailing clouds of glory Do we come from God Who is our home. William Wordsworth  Ode on Intimations of Immortality

Clouds Of Glory

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Ken Nye. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Ken Nye

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Ken Nye. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Searching for the Spring: Poetic Reflections of Maine

From the Heart: Poetic Reflections on Growing Old in Maine

A Dog is a Gift: A poetic celebration of living with a dog

Clouds Of Glory