The problem with waking

Steven John Reid
Wed, 29 Apr 2026 13:45:23 PDT

'The problem with waking' investigates the human struggle of coming to an awareness of self and the self's place among those who make up key relationships throughout life. The emphasis of the text is on locating moments in which the human essence is revealed against a variety of landscapes including forests, lakeshores, ice rinks, urban streets, and an international array of bars, from Chinese nightclubs to Alaskan pubs. Within the poems there is always an awareness of the poem on the page, on striking a visual balance in stanza length and white space. Line lengths are determined fundamentally on the belief that the strength of a poem is based on the creation and resolution of tensions and on a sensitivity to sound. Within the landscapes, representative moments are sought out and made lyric. Simple actions, often fragments of larger events, take on microcosmic, even mythical importance.