This book tells, with the heartfelt power of a father's poetic prose, the story of the first sixteen years of the life of his daughter Kristin, an amazing human being who at birth was described as being a vegetable. It took Robert Nichols over ten years to write this little book telling the distress and delight of his years as the father of a child with Down syndrome. But, this is not a book about a chromosomal abnormality, or even about disability. It is the story, wrenched from the very ...

It began as a mass attack on writer's block. My strategy: Write a 200 word essay every day during the summer of 2000. What it became, once I dispelled the nonsense of “grander notions of the purpose of art," was this collection of some of the best words I have ever written, such as the following excerpts: And when air is given flight in laughter, and food is given art in flavor, and sex is given bliss in love--we're talking profound existence. / Truth spoken becomes myth. Life given to myt...

Maybe it started with driving the motorcycle through a barbed wire fence at 60 mph. Or maybe it was the not-so-casual fling with the preacher’s wife. Or perhaps it was when, nineteen years old and hitchhiking the whole wide nation, in a glimpse of the Gods, his spirit expanded to all the infinite edges of a Wyoming roadside. Whatever the cause, Bill Mason’s life was driven by Art: Art that nearly killed him, Art that was his soul. It can be dangerous to be poet/novelist. It is a good story...

His life destroyed by a bolt of lightning, he spent a decade haphazardly wandering the land hiding from God. But his young bride was actually killed by a radio evangelist/messianic fiend called Brother Earl. Upon the stark rock Mountain of Three Days he and his mentor, a desert sage of a sand-sung Indian mystic named Glory Hallelujah, confront the Legions of Death with rage and metaphor. Speaking of which, while defending a lady against assault by a barroom motorcycle gang, with nose blood...

In "Ardours and Endurances; Also, A Faun's Holiday & Poems and Phantasies," Robert Nichols intricately weaves a tapestry of poetic exploration that delves into the profound dichotomies of human experience: love and loss, joy and sorrow. Nichols's literary style is marked by its rich imagery and rhythmic fluidity, demonstrating a keen understanding of both classical influences and modernist sensibilities. The collection stands out for its philosophical depth and emotional resonance, positio...

about Seasons—the Wind and Weather of Our Days: Celebrating Fear and Feeling Alive, is the third in the Footlocker Series of books. These works are a gathering of over fifty years of poetry and prose written by me, Robert Nichols. When I write, I seek to express what is most intimate in my experience in terms that reach a world of readers with universal connection. I’m not the only one out here who gets giddy with the chilled promise of autumn and the lusting energies of spring. And it’s n...

about Time: Poems and Other Stories is the first in a series of collections of works spanning over fifty years of creation by poet, novelists, singer, picker, sculptor, spirit-drummer Robert Nichols. To his readers, Robert would say, “If you don’t understand this, it isn't poetry.” He believes the artist must connect with the audience for art to happen. Thus it is that he has strived to give his stories, reflections, and musings about matters primal, personal, and Cosmic an intimate, archi...

about Mountain Living Summary A journey told in story and poem. A life trek from discontent and restlessness to commitment and discovery. You know, the ‘way’ we all should seek—the path to self-actualization. For me, my ‘way’ began with timeclock toil and its shackles of security and comfort. But, due to a quirk in life trajectory when I was fifteen, instead of an accountant or a tool-and-die maker, I became a poet. Well, this poet gave normalcy a try for a couple of decades and then heade...

Uncle Bob’s Big Book of Happy I should make this clear from the start. None of this is easy. The first chapter of this book starts out saying exactly that: This will not be easy. I tell some hard truths. Don’t be misled by the mirthful lilt of my title. Uncle Bob here will do his best to help you be happy, but none of this means diddly-squat if you if you can’t face harsher aspects of our everyday journey. Happy and easy—I don’t think so. Not in the world I tell. Matters profound, intimate...

The Great Book of Bob is a unified collection of humorous, soul-wrenching, and harshly honest tales and thoughts gleaned from a lifelong love story—stories of a poet’s love of sunrises, poetic epiphanies, laughter, and for the soul mate of his life. And the best part about it, it’s not some icky-sticky, lovey-poo bunch of hearts and flowers. It’s hard-edged wonder and real reason for all of us to be glad to be alive. Robert Nichols tells his stories that we may each realize the significanc...

Greg Watson was just a regular enough school teacher fellow when, in order to quit taking debilitating pills to control his high blood pressure, he began to practice Hush Meditation. It worked. His numbers dropped to normal and his love life rose back to normal. All was well until, during meditation, a strange little man in a monk's cowl appeared and directed him to shoot a crossbow arrow into a tiny sector of his own brain. (Hence, the title, Albatross.) "What have I done?" Greg asked. "O...

Think of it as a High Wind. A Force that blows across the Universe scattering the night-burning stars. A Force of such beauty and power that no mortal being can possibly bear to stand fully before it without being torn forever from this Earth.Think of this High Wind as being the creative energy of the Cosmos. It is the omnipotent Source of all the enlightenment of the human spirit and, just as it has scattered the stars, it, too, has scattered the souls of a million poets into the infinite...