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Order from Big Table Publishing and Amazon (2023)
“Richard’s Fox’s DOUBLE CHAI is a wonder. His rollicking Zady poems paint a vivid, loving portrait of his feisty, Orthodox Jewish/working class grandfather from the Old Country. Fox’sevocation of a long-gone time and place, and the outsized personalities who dwell there, is profound, humane and very funny. His poems are positively cinematic…and you will learn Yiddish! As a fellow incurable cancer patient, I can also attest to Fox’s unique ability to shed light, and even grim humor, on the horrifying ‘cancer journey’ too many of us undertake. So, bravo to Richard Fox, for sharing with us his singular voice and vision.I can’t recommend DOUBLE CHAI highly enough!”
~ Karen Friedland, author of Places That Are Gone and Tales from the Teacup Palace
“Richard Fox is a mensch. He comes by it naturally, and shares with us his love for his family—expertly drawn here as three-dimensional, flawed people who nurtured him in every way—in treasured moments that fed his body and his mind with laughter, love and Faith. Whether ‘Counting the Candles on Zady’sCake,’ or teaching us how ‘Grief Becomes Grace,’ the familial traditions, lessons, and anecdotes flavor a young poet’s awareness. Fox has the gift of deft description, his scenes living in the mind’s eye long after this treasured photo album of a book is finished.”
~ Christopher Reilley, author of One Night Stanzas
“In this book of poems and prose (that is sort of a memoir), poet Richard Fox gives his readers hilarious snapshots into his life growing up with his assorted and often bizarre extended family, many who could be characters in a Neil Simon movie. Essentially, hilarity and ignored common sense rule the day. The car trip piece was one of my favorites, but then again there were so many pieces and poems in this book that tickled my funny bone and stirred my mind. Most highly recommended.
~ Susan Isla Tepper, author of Office and What Drives Men
Order from Big Table Publishing and Amazon (2022)
Includes the third cycle of Cassie poems. Preface by John Hodgen.
A masterful wordsmith tells it like it was, like it is, and like it ought to be. Fox’s everlasting themes of time, nature, familial bonds, and existence are elegantly folded into each piece. His words are sharp, filled with deeply telling imagery and sentimentality. Fox doesn’t just write of people and places, he takes you there, and for just a moment you become a part of his life. Once I was born to live is a striking body of work that is written with the temerity of legacy.
~ Renuka Raghavan, Nothing Resplendent Lives Here
This powerful new collection by Richard Fox is moving and delightful. To quote his Uncle Louie, “You earned your ribeye, kid!” ~ Lori Desrosiers, Keeping Planes in the Air
Richard Fox, like us all was ‘born to live’ but this collection of his living, breathing poetry is born to live on your bookshelves forever, to be removed, breathed upon, and celebrated.~ Timothy Gager, 2020 Poems
How I love the universe that Richard Fox invites me to visit: Zayde, Uncle Louie, Cassie, Beeb, Bekah. I know them all. And the friends and fellow travelers in the infusion rooms, the hospice wards. Family. ‘Spectators soothe the living.’ Richard Fox’s book Once I was born to live is about love. ‘I love you,’ he writes. Thank you, Richard, for your gift of love. ~ Jennifer Martelli, Queen of Queens
Richard Fox travels to the heart of living in Once I was born to live. His poems truly are a ‘deft landing,’ a testament to his writing. He knows how to deliver. His honesty, a force that grabs, and doesn’t let go.~ Gloria Mindock, editor of Červená Barva Press
Being Jewish I delighted in this cornucopia of ethnic food, the enigma wrapped in a mystery of a Jewish family, and remembered my own nana, eccentric uncles, and that long lost connection to an old world that informs the new. ~ Doug Holder, Co-President of the New England Poetry Club
These poems sing of the subtle treasures and piercing bittersweetness of human existence. You’ll long for more time, more life, more poetry, after reading this beautiful book. ~ Chloe McFeters, C is for Courage, Still, But Not Silent, and Journey into Poetry
The peal of chimes behind his words is ever-present in the worlds he creates unfolding on the page.~ Susan Isla Tepper, What Drives Men
Order from Big Table Publishing and Amazon (2022)
Includes the second cycle of Cassie poems.
Survival is the force propelling this gripping hybrid of poetry, prose and prose poems. The essential element here: In order to make it on this planet you must grab onto every necessary and delicious person/place/object/event and stuff yourself silly— until you almost can’t breathe. Richard Fox knows this by heart."— Susan Tepper, author of What Drives Men and The Merrill Diaries
Richard Fox, a tangle of contradictions. A certain spareness and when able, pays close attention to the world. — Liz Rosenberg, author of Indigo Hill and Children of Paradise
Here are three things you need to know about Richard Fox’s poetry: It is as universal as it is Jewish; it is as honest about living as it is about dying, and it is as skillful with memory as it is with words, arrangement, and imagery. Before I read Richard, I wondered how the Kaddish got away with it, being a mourner’s prayer with no mention of mourning. Now I know. The poems of Let sleep bless our arrival glorify, celebrate, laud, praise, acclaim, honor, extol and exalt. They also call out, laugh, character-ize, cherish comrades two-footed and four, contain no artificial sweeteners, embolden, embrace. And re-embrace. Let this volume’s awakening bless our remaining.
— Wayne-Daniel Berard, co-founding editor of Soul-Lit, a journal of spiritual poetry, and author of Art of Enlightenment
Order from Big Table Publishing or Amazon (2020)
includes the first cycle of Cassie poems
"embracing the burlesque of collateral damage is a braided narrative, meaning poems which tell two stories, and the voice in the poems is the link between them. Richard Fox tackles fearlessly, in honest and beautifully crafted poetry, the intricacies and pain of love, family, acceptance and illness. His poems about cancer are particularly stunning. At the end of his poem “The Dying Poets Society” Fox asks an existential question that is both personal, and to those of us endeavoring to live and write in the shadow of cancer, universal: “I wonder how many more times I will shout from this stage, whether the poetry we crafted is destined for dust or anchors.”
- Lori Desrosiers, author of several books of poetry, the latest, Keeping Planes in the Air
“When I choose the word ‘valuable’ to describe Richard Fox’s latest collection, embracing the burlesque of collateral damage, I do so deliberately, because to read these poems, which move the reader back and forth, sometimes dizzyingly, between the middle of the last century and the current day, is to receive gift after gift, courtesy of a writer whose wit, humor, and compassion are extraordinary. Whether the people you meet are women, men, and children with whom the speaker shares a cancer journey in 2019, or hippie comrades from half a century ago, these are beings you won’t soon forget. Some of the poems will wring your heartstrings; others will tickle your funny bone. Don’t read these poems unless you are willing to learn, body part by hospital stay by chemo treatment, what a cancer journey is really like, when it is being lived and observed by someone who is paying full attention to the details. Do read them if you are in love with the whole splashy, wild, experience that is the human condition.”
- Annie Stenzel author of First Home Air After Absence
“Richard H. Fox’s latest collection, embracing the burlesque of collateral damage, explores and confronts the drama—the poetry—within the body. We are introduced to the mundane and apathetic horror of cancer: a mother, about to endure another chemo session, must leave her infant with her twin sister. Fox is a master of this twining and twinning: the story of his cancer is woven with the story of family—Cassie, Meg, Beeb, and of course, Uncle Louie. Fox tells an earthy, visceral story-in-verse of Holocaust survivors, children of pogroms, cheap beer, domestic abuse, and enduring devotion. This lineage is as much a part of the body as disease; this history is as much a part of the story as cancer. Our bodies dictate the rules./No wild cards, aces high, fresh decks. Fox greets the indignity of cancer treatment with humor and an unflinching eye. He asks us, the receivers of his poems, Do you hear my poems? Yes, and we’re left, at the end, understanding the threshold on which we balance. Thank you, Richard H. Fox, for this masterful collection. I, for one, will carry embracing the burlesque of collateral damage with me for a long time.
~ Jennifer Martelli author of The Uncanny Valley and My Tarantella
Order from Big Table Publishing or Amazon (2017)
includes 2017 Frank O'Hara Prize Winner "Skating on the edge of flesh"
“In the title poem of this collection, a woman says, ‘You’re my favorite horse, wish you’d get in the race.’ And indeed, in these poems, Richard Fox is all in, particularly in his race against the cancer that he suspects will soon cut short his life. He captures memories that could well disappear—of his irascible Uncle Louie raising hell at the track, of fishmongers with an arsenal of cleavers and knuckle tins, of Jewish immigrants cracking wise in Yiddish. This doesn't mean the poems are rushed; all the while, he finds time for heartbreaking tenderness, like his wish that his dog will ‘watch over me / to know that my body became a corpse, / to know I didn’t just leave him.’ In You’re My Favorite Horse, Richard Fox has written a book of great humor, compassion, and wisdom.”
- Jessica Jacobs, author of Pelvis with Distance and In Whatever Light Is Left To Us
"Unlike any other form, a poem is a conversation. Richard Fox knows how to bring discourse to an unabashed place which is at once challenging, vulnerable, erotic and superbly human. Death hovers above all and Fox reaches out to touch it with humor and sharp tongue. His words confront and bedazzle cancer, family and faith. Thoughtfully shaped with craft and time, these poems demonstrate what a master can do when he puts his pen to it."
- Jim Gustafson, author of Take Fun Seriously, Driving Home., and Unassisted Living
“The poems in Richard Fox’s latest collection brim with grace and truth. With great precision and courage, Fox leads the reader into the disorienting darkness of illness and loss, of longing and memory, and illuminates that darkness with wisdom, humor, and hope. This is a stunning book.”
- Eliza Locke author of Kissing In Iceland and The Tree Angel: A True Urban Tale
“In You’re my favorite horse, the latest collection by poet Richard H. Fox, we are taken on an unforgettable adventure. From Fox’s vulnerable bathroom conversations with a crow and a dog, to a crowded and hopeful hospital room with a 'boy [who] can sew,' to an unconventional hair salon with a 'guillotine notched sink,' we experience the hard truths and deep emotions of illness, loss, love, and regret. In the end, Fox’s wise and exquisite poems remind us, gently and masterfully, that 'it is nearly dusk' for each one of us, and ask: What will we do with this light we have left?”
- Chloé McFeters author of C is for Courage, The Ally Within and Still, But Not Silent
OUT OF STOCK.
Second edition with added poems pending.
Richard Fox went on stage in Worcester, Massachusetts and read poems concerning Uncle Louie. They were funny, and wise, and full of Yiddish joy. It was a lovely day at the reading when Richard read an Uncle Louie story. That's how I think of them. They are poems, first and foremost, well composed and balanced. But really, these are damn good tales we might hear after a few glasses of Seagram's Seven or a nice cup of slivowitz (that's plum brandy that requires a Cossack's stomach to get down). When Richard read out the latest news of Uncle Louie, I sat, transfixed, with a large smile on my face.
- David Macpherson - author and nost of LISTEN! at Nick's-Worcester
Order from Big Table Publishing or Amazon (2015)
nominated for a Pushcart Prize by Big Table Publishing
What are you looking for? I think you'll find it here in Richard H. Fox's second poetry collection, wandering in puzzle boxes. They're all present and accounted for: the poems of love and loss, health and healing, identity and homage, the lyrics and the narratives intertwined. When this speaker tells me, "I want to wear Coke-bottle glasses, corneas blue whale eyes," I believe him. In fact, I'd follow this man down Alligator Alley and the Massachusetts Turnpike. I'd stand beside him in "the mourner's waiting line," share a beer while "a folk singer/belts out francophone lyrics over a dreadnought." I say I would, but I already have. Put your thumb out, and hitch this humble, honest ride."
- Julie Marie Wade, author of When I Was Straight: Poems and Postage Due: Poems & Prose Poems
"Eleanor Roosevelt spoke of the confidence and courage that come when one has looked fear in the face. She could have been speaking about Rich Fox, whose new book is testament to that remarkable confidence and courage. These poems ring with a power and intensity that come only after achieving a kind of fearlessness, having looked fear in the face and becoming empowered to speak honestly and with great conviction now about love and war and loss and friendship. Fox wanders in the puzzle box of life with a clear-eyed intensity, as a gifted writer, observer and friend to us all, writing with 'flashes of yearning, grace' about this puzzling, mysterious, and infinitely beautiful world."
- John Hodgen, AWP Donald Hall Prize in Poetry, author of Grace and Heaven & Earth Holding Company
"Fox is a writer worth paying attention to."
- Victor D. Infante, Telegram.com
"Richard Fox’s unique muse wanders through the landscapes of cancer, aging, mourning, Judaism and Boomer memory to produce poems of riveting power and imagination. His cancer poems are unforgettable and his remembrances of times past and friends lost are propelled by a compelling lyrical narrative that seeks to unlock the truth from the puzzle boxes of life and loss within us."
- Joe Pacheco, Sanibel Joe's Songbook and Alligator in the Sky
Available direct from author only. Please email at link below.
“TIME BOMB is a testament to maturity and hard-won wisdom. These finely crafted poems radiate intelligence, black humor and vivid imagination, and are filled with imagery that startles repeatedly but always feels exactly right. Richard Fox is a poet whose raw materials are illness, loss, and disappointment and like the alchemists of old, he changes lead to gold.”
- Charles Coe, author of Picnic on the Moon and All Sins Forgiven: Poems for My Parents
“Richard Fox honors the phrase 'provoked to poetry.' His poems are provoking and provocative and the very best of them deal with suffering and illness, with wildness and a new kind of Jewish identity. Time Bomb is not cancer free. It is vital and essential reading.”
- Liz Rosenberg, author of The Laws of Gravity and Home Repair
“Rich Fox calls himself a small poet at large, but there is nothing small about the poems in Time Bomb. They are large-themed and large-hearted, framed by a world at war with itself and a world all the more lovely when it is almost taken from us, when we see how filled to overflowing it is with light and joy and longing and loss. These are well crafted, poignant, clever and ultimately wise poems which leave the reader wanting to believe one can throw one’s arms around this hard won world, and, better yet, that the world will hold us in its arms as well.”
- John Hodgen, AWP Donald Hall Prize in Poetry, author of Heaven & Earth Holding Company and Grace
"I found myself reading Time Bomb the way I read Shakespeare ... slow, savoring each line individually before considering its contribution to the poem. With descriptive precision and loving humor Richard Fox brought me deeper into his world than I would have previously believed possible. This was the most satisfying read I have had in years." - Don White, author, singer songwriter, comedian