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Noon Out of Nowhere: Complete Poems and Aphorisms
by Alan Harris
389 Poems, 511 pages
Price: Free
Publisher: Alan Harris
ISBN #: NA, online PDF
Access Link: Go to https://alharris.com/poems/pdf/noon.pdf
ABOUT THE BOOK:
Alan Harris has gathered all of his poems and aphorisms from 1963 through 2021into a single PDF entitled “Noon Out of Nowhere–Complete Poems and Aphorisms” and is offering it free online. The writing is very accessible, and individual poems can be printed from the PDF. The table of contents lists each poem title alphabetically, where clicking on a poem title brings up that poem. The book can also be read sequentially. Forms of the poems are free verse, rhymed, haiku, and sonnets, including three sets of aphorisms: “Daresayings,” “Pieces of Mind,” and “Spared for Seed.” The subject matter of the poems varies widely: inspirational, psychological, philosophical, mystical, Christmas, death, love, grief, whimsy, satire, relationships, humor, and more.
ADVANCE PRAISE:
Alan Harris’s 58 years of accumulated wisdom has found a home in this 511-page compendium of superb poetry. From pithy aphorisms, to haiku, to social justice poems, as well as seasonal and faith-based poems, there is something for everyone in Noon Out of Nowhere.
–Michael Escoubas, author of Ripples Into the Light: PhotoPoetry, with photographer Van-dana Bajikar
I have read several of Alan Harris’s poems and have listened to him read many of his poems in an ongoing poetry group in Tucson, Arizona. Alan is a very capable poet, able to dismantle any moment with its beauty and essence. He can take a thought, and from the inside out take a reader on a listening trip with music, awareness, and hallelujahs to their depth. If Rilke is the "seeing poet," Harris is the photographer with stills in every line, whispering in images that matter.
–William Killian, author of All the Faces I Have Been: An Actor's Notebook
An extraordinary six-decade gift of deep wisdom and broad creativity, Noon Out of Nowhere offers Alan Harris’ lifetime collection of poetry, including hundreds of original aphorisms. A cursory scan of the alphabetical table of contents reveals a dizzying array of themes. Savor three-line gems like “Darkness” and three-page narratives like “Farmer Karma.” Enjoy the variety of free verse, rhyme, list, shape poetry, haiku, and even sheet music. And it’s all free, downloadable from his website!
–Kathy Lohrum Cotton, author of Aligned with the Sky
Alan Harris started his journey of poetry with “Continuity” and the trek has led eventually to his latest offering, “Drifting.” In “Continuity” he speaks of how “Yesterday the sun went down; / This morning it came up / as it has, / as it will.” This book of poetry is so vast and varied with his assortment of poetic forms. He does so with deft touch for each. He is more than just a poet; he is a philosopher as well. So, open this book and open your mind–you will be “Drifting” to self-awareness and introspection thanks to his words.
–jacob erin-cilberto, author of Fishing for Intellectual Meteors
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Alan Harris, a past president of the Illinois State Poetry Society, was born to a farming family in Earlville, Illinois. He is retired from a computer career with Commonwealth Edison, Chicago, where he served as a programmer and Web developer. He has been writing poems and aphorisms since his college days in 1963. Between 1982 and 1995 he print-published ten books of poems and aphorisms for friends and family. These books and 15 subsequent online poetry books are available as free downloadable PDFs on his literary website “An Everywhere Oasis” at alharris.com. Since 1996 he has maintained his daily-changing aphorisms page: “Thinker’s Daily Ponderable.”
FROM THE BOOK:
My Cow, My Guru
by Alan Harris
My brown cow
lives in the now.
How?
Nohow.
Quantity and time and hay slide
through her unnoticed. She
doesn't count her stomachs
or her breaths or her days.
She seeks no acupuncture
treatments, nor does she
brew herbal teas.
Being the best she can be
holds no interest for her as
she grazingly meditates with
slow-moving hooves and jaws
over a grassy pasture.
Her Buddhic eyes see
out and in all the way.
My cow knows an old, old mantra
that she neither flaunts nor hides–
when the world needs a moo,
she gives it one.
As her swishing tail
with Zen precision
scatters a bunch of flies
like unwelcome thoughts,
my brown cow's gaze is
inly intimating to me,
"No how is there to now."
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