Jean LeBlanc LeBlanc

Skating in Concord Jean LeBlanc LeBlanc

These poems take readers into the world of Henry David Thoreau and his circle of acquaintances: Ralph Waldo Emerson, Margaret Fuller, Louisa May Alcott. These poems also bring Thoreau into the present, imagining him as a living entity in our lives-and with him comes a renewed appreciation for the beauty of the world around us, a world in which astonishment animates every moment. To read these poems is to be "nose-deep in life, too busy for the leaving of it."Jean LeBlanc grew up in central Massachusetts and still connects her love for nature and literature to the landscape and history of New England. She now lives and teaches in northwestern New Jersey, returning to her native place via poetry. Her collections include The Haiku Aesthetic: Short Form Poetry as a Study in Craft (Cyberwit.net, 2013) and At Any Moment (Backwaters Press, 2010)."Jean LeBlanc's Skating in Concord is a brazenly celebratory re imagining of Henry David Thoreau. Throw in a number of his contemporaries -- Ralph Waldo Emerson, Margaret Fuller and Louisa May Alcott for additional seasoning and you start to get the picture. Luckily for us the characters in these poems straddle the ages under LeBlanc's nimble thumb, it is as though they exist in the past and the present. Jean LeBlanc is really a time-travelling magician. Nothing feels out of place in these poems which is to say that everything feels just right inside the inviting universe that still has Henry David checking out the scenery." --Michael Dennis, Today's Book of Poetry