Thursday, November 28, 2013

Canadian Poet Jim Bennett

Poetry is not all about gloom and doom; mostly, it is about the beauty of our language in an expression of reflection, life and yes, loss, but also about celebration and – as here in Jim Bennett’s case – a bit of tongue-in-cheek as well regarding his moniker image.

Of course, I asked him what it meant and I am embarrassed that I didn't guess. He kindly elaborated for me:

“There is a place in Up the Organization where Townsend says, what would a Martian make of this problem, understanding everything about life on earth except anything related to this problem? Explain it to this Martian, please? Since I was Application Architect, I asked 'the Martian question' often. So, as a joke, I had a globe of Mars on my desk, with the ambiguous figure 'Mowgli' looking at it.”

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Putting on his serious poet’s hat, Bennett explains: “Poetry is about experience, and has the power to transmit that experience to readers; what it means to be alive and mortal.”

Here are the published volumes of
Jim Bennett’s evocative poetry:

Cold Comes Through





Life is about loss. In the end, we all die. Yet we may face illness and reduced capacity, expected and unexpected, with fear or courage, faith or despair. These fifty poems are about that experience....







Behind the Lime Kiln


This collection is about relationships. These poems were written for human beings living in today's world, that is, for us, and thus for you.

Hard Landing   



Fifty-seven unique, sometimes scary, experiences. This selection of poems is not for children, nor is it for squeamish adults. The collection probes unique personal problems of different lives in difficult situations.









The Scroll of the Violin



These poems cover a range of philosophy, religion, belief and unbelief: religious poems, atheist poems, questioning poems, and answering ones.










Jim Bennett not only writes poetry, he also leads workshops and participates in a regular writers’ group.

He is also a prolific and conscientious reader and critiquer for the Kindle Book Review (KBR). So far, he has done 48 formal KBR reviews, and some 14 informal reviews.

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But before you rush off and send him your novels, let me tell you from experience that he is tough, honest, and very stingy with his five stars. And rightly so. We’ll never get better by being gushed over and coddled (sigh), but by receiving constructive critiques.

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Jim Bennett began his publishing career in such literary magazines as The Fiddlehead, Event, The New Quarterly, and Prairie Fire.

He started writing poetry in high school. Mentored by an English teacher, and rekindled years later by Richard Ketchum of Humber College, Jim began creating and never looked back.

With a Masters Degree in Pure Mathematics, he became a programmer, designer, and eventually application architect. You’d expect Jim to be technical rather than poetic.  But suspecting poets rarely get rich by their work; hence he remained in this field to fund his family and his other interests.

Jim also takes pictures; all the images on his website are his, as are the cover images on his last two collections of poetry. He keeps tropical fish.

Jim Bennett’s poetry books can be found at Amazon

Print versions are available from the Lulu Store in paperback and as e-pubs:

I urge you to visit Jim Bennett’s website where you will find some great images and also a few interesting observations about life in today’s Canada.


Lastly, thank you Jim, for giving us a glimpse of the man behind the poet. 

4 comments:

  1. It is I who should thank Inge H. Borg for this well-crafted presentation of my work. Gratefully, I value her as a friend and fellow writer. Thank you, Inge. Jim Bennett

    ReplyDelete
  2. It was entirely my pleasure, Jim. Your poetry needs to be shared.

    ReplyDelete