On a Gathering of Kestrels by Tim Keane
by Jennifer Kassebaum
This is Jennifer Kassebaum, owner of Flint Hills Books in Council Grove Kansas, for High Plains Public Radio Reader’s Summer Book Club Reading List.
Recently I had the privilege of hosting a book launch for poet Tim Keane for his recent poetry collection titled A GATHERING OF KESTRELS. Tim is a Kansas State University Professor Emeritus of Landscape Architecture. In retirement, Tim attends Cowboy Poetry events and competitions, and is building a name for himself among Cowboy Poets. To distinguish his most recent poetry collection from his cowboy poetry, Tim published the collection under the name T. D. Keane. The artful cover is a photograph by the poet of the Flint Hills in the fall in the brilliant light of a sunset.
But A GATHERING OF KESTRELS is NOT cowboy poetry. This collection is an ode to life in the Flint Hills. This is a new collection of poems written in a dozen years after Tim arrived in Kansas in 1987. Twenty-five years ago, the poetry collection was shared, unbeknownst to Tim, with Tony Moffeit, Director of the Pueblo Poetry Project in Pueblo Colorado. Moffeit reviewed and praised the collection to mutual friends.
Tim is rather modest and humble, and I think it took 25 years for him to have the courage to seek to have the collection published. He found a publisher in Blue Cedar Press, owned by Michael Poague – who is also a fine poet -- and Gretchen Eik.
A GATHERING OF KESTRELS is a collection of poems about nature, about the creatures – including people -who inhabit nature, and about agricultural life and working with your hands. While I won’t do Tim justice with my reading, I want to give you a short taste of the lovely poetry that you will find in A GATHERING OF KESTRELS.
The first poem of the collection is
“CANTO” Walk softly on the prairie there are spirits resting there The wind is their blanket the sage their prayer.
To end this review, I want to share with you a final poem from A GATHERING OF KESTRELS that is a nod to writers everywhere, and which contains that stroke of humor that the reader will find in many of Tim Keane’s poetry:
Ruminations If you wish to learn to write Watch a cow Slowly it grazes the field of ideas then it swallows The thoughts lie quiet, safely held, becoming richer, thicker When time allows, they are brought back, chewed again All nourishment is gleaned, and of course, There is some manure
You can find A GATHERING OF KESTRELS at many independent bookstores in Kansas, including Watermark Books in Wichita and Flint Hills Books in Council Grove. Ask your public library to stock a copy of this delightful collection that is an homage to the agricultural heart of Kansas.
This is Jennifer Kassebaum for High Plains Public Radio Reader’s Summer Book Bytes.
