Bøker av Joseph M Lopez

This book of words is written to honor the land and capture the essence of Door County. To extract and give back. To speak and celebrate us. The people. My people. My land. This is a county with heart. And kindness. With love and respect for Lake Michigan. And reverence for its bluffs. I write to acknowledge the fact that we are witness to wonder, and magic. That we are lucky to live here. Lucky to know such a place, with such people. This is an attempt at a proper way to say thank you.

This is a follow up to my debut book, Sounds Unheard Songs of Home. We write to build. To rebuild. To forgive others. To give the same to ourselves. We write of longing, and languishing. Of love. And regret. Of easy days. And jobs that are not. Of pink haired old ladies at the grocery store. Of hope. Sometimes. If she isn't dead. Of pulling off our flesh, and sounding ourselves loud. Of birds that sing in broken song, and coyotes tasting marrow from our bones. Of the skin of us. And scars that hold. Of a lake that owns us. In which we could drown. Of her persistence. And our own.Of the things we carry. And the space we hold.Of snow in August, under bare feet. Of the rise and fall of indifference. And of something in between. Of yellow fucking tomatoes. Simply because they exist. And how we stand in July.In grays and blues. Wet with rain. Warm, and barefooted. Steady and slow.This is a story of coming home.

Amply titled, 'Scared Gods' is a journal of a man the land has exulted, seeing its being through his eyes."My eyes are not the color of the sky. Or of the hungry lake that knows my name. They are the bluffs that kiss such things-"Lopez writes seemingly with ease and precision, never wasting or spoiling a word. He refuses to waste sound, everything is used, carved out slowly like a mountain through time. It is as if you can feel his surroundings by running your fingers across the page, each word is pronounced bravely in this way. Each poem stands alone, effective as a prayer, Scared Gods is a river, a journey that runs and walks, that whispers to inspire.-Gregory J. Underwood

From the author of Sounds Unheard Songs of Home, and The Lethargy of Fog, comes A Season Through the Door. The images in this book will walk you through a season of farming in Door County. This book opens and closes with a poem. Descriptions of each of the over 20 images are on the page before each design. With his love of nature, and years spent farming, Joseph brings a book for all ages to enjoy. This is a coloring book with designs drawn directly from his experiences on the farm. To see examples of what's in the book, head over to Joseph's Instagram page @j.l.writer.