Is, Is Not

Tess Gallagher is a poet, essayist, fiction writer and playwright. She has published many books, including five poetry titles in Britain with Bloodaxe, most recently Midnight Lantern: New & Selected Poems (2012), and her later collection, Is Is Not (2019). She has published two collections of stories, The Lover of Horses (1986) and At the Owl Woman Saloon (1997), and two books of essays, A Concert of Tenses: Essays on Poetry (1986) and Soul Barnacles: Ten More Years with Ray (2000). She co-authored two screenplays with Raymond Carver, and later contributed to the making of the Robert Altman film Short Cuts, based on Carver's work. She spends parts of each year in the West of Ireland, and her collection of oral stories from Ireland, Barnacle Soup, co-authored with Irish painter and storyteller Josie Gray, was published by Blackstaff Press in 2007.

'The book itself is dedicated to two great loves (the American writer Raymond Carver, and the Irish painter and storyteller, Josie Gray) and its narratives echo through time... Beneath all the places, stories and loves, this poet finds that deep resonance of common essence. There is beauty and grief and humour here; there is a gentle wisdom; there is a quiet, incremental insight that sings us awake. I treasure these poems.' - Jane Mead

• Recognition 1iIn the Company of Flowers 5Almost Lost Moment 6Ambition 7Your Dog Playing with a Coyote 9Ability to Hold Territory 10Blind Dog/Seeing Girl 12Doe Browsing Salal Berries 14iiLittle Inside Out Dream, 17Dream Cancel 19Stolen Dress 21Glass Impresses 23Hummingbird-Mind 25One Deer at Dusk 26iiiCorrection 31Sully 33Retroactive Father 36Earth 38The Seemingly Domesticated 39Reaching 41Right-Minded Person 44In the Too-Bright Café 45ivLet’s Store These Hours 51Season of Burnt-Out Candelabras 53The Branches of the Maple 56Yet to Be Born Weather 57I Want to Be Loved Like Somebody’s Beloved Dog in America 59While I Was Away 63vWithout 67Deer Path Enigma 69The Favorite Cup 70What Does It Say 71viBus to Belfast 75Is, Is Not 76As the Diamond 78During the Montenegrin Poetry Reading 81Curfew 83Eddie’s Steps 84Four-Footed 86The Gold Dust of the Linden Trees 88Blue Eyelid Lifting 91viiButton, Button 95Breath 99To an Irishman Painting in the Rain 100Encounter 102Planet Greece 103Cloud-Path 105viiiOliver 109A “Sit” with Eileen 112Remembering Each Other While Together 115Opening 117Word of Mouth 118Daylong Visitor Caress 123March Moon Three Stars 125Afterword: Writing from the Edge: A Poet of Two Northwests 127Notes 135Acknowledgments 139