This is background information. You can escape in the following ways:

• If you want to see the blog, click on the link at left.Then bookmark that page.
• Click here to return to my marketing.
• If you want free Samples, click on the link at left to see poems that were published somewhere, but are not included in my books for sale here. In all cases I retained copyright. That means you have ‘free use’ but cannot re-sell or claim authorship. If you use my free material on your website, you should credit me. That simple.

If you’re still here, you must be curious about either this poet or his poetry.
Poetry is about truth and experience. A good poem should truly convey some sense of an experience to you, the reader. So you might ask, who is this person and why should I consider acquiring one of his poetry collections?

If you follow my blog, you’ll find that I’m interested in politics, science, current events, et cetera, including interesting individuals, good and bad. You should get a sense of what kind and size of mind created the poems I’m offering to you. I am not a stupid person. I assume you are not a stupid person either. My poems are written for everyone, yet some are a bit more work to understand than a nursery rhyme. Generally, you were expecting that when you started reading, right?

In the blog you will also see some reviews I’ve been asked to do, of the works of other writers. I’ve done many more reviews than appear here; these are the ones that asked to be here. Generally my reviews are on Amazon Kindle, and some are on GoodReads. A few are on other websites, as per the author’s request. I am a member of the Kindle Book Review Team. I also do informal reviews, on request, literally if I feel like doing so: that is, if the work interests me and I think my small input might be indicative to the writer of possibilities for improvement.

If you go to my author pages, and ‘peek inside’ at Amazon.com, you’ll get a sense of what my writing is like. I went to some trouble to make that peek see poetry, not T.O.C. and acknowledgements. Have a look. Also, do go to Samples and read a bit.

Put another way: if you purchase a copy of one of my poetry collections, you’re in for a pleasant surprise. The poems have been workshopped after being selected for quality; they are all top-drawer and have been chosen with care, generally around the theme of the book they are in. I am generally a nicer person as a poet than as a blogger, but not always; the collection Hard Landing contains some pretty rough situations.

That said, my name is Jim Bennett. You are invited to comment on anything anywhere. Comments are moderated (see “Rules, Sort of”) before they appear on the site.

The Page Heading Images
These are all images taken by me with a Panasonic camera. The lizard is in Panama City, the bluebirds (not sure what they really are) are in the outdoor restaurant area of Gamboa nature reserve (Panama), the camels are in the Sahara desert in Morocco, the bizarre figurines from a storefront in I think Spain, the models/statues are in Galeries Lafayette (Paris), the butterfly at our shack (and it is a shack) on MacLean aka Black Lake, and the bizarre cement face is on a large farm-like property north of Huntsville.

The Blog
The blog will contain various kinds of entries. Go look and see.

My Writing
I am a writer, mostly poetry, with some previous publishing successes. I have  put up poetry collections on Amazon for the Kindle reader and PC/Mac and others. The collections are also available on Lulu as ePub files, and in paperback there as well.

See my page Available Now for all the details.

Some free samples of other poems are available on the Samples page. Enjoy.

Hobbies and Interests
My interests include biology and religion. I started out with Shroedinger’s title question, What is Life and delved into biochemistry, biology, microscopy. Quantum effects became important so I sort-of understand that (badly). Social effects made themselves noticed, thus a study of Joseph Campbell and Bruce Feiler, on myths and religion. I have read the Koran in two different (English) translations, cover to cover. I do not claim to understand it, but I have a fair idea of what it says. I think.
My own religious background is Christian, now highly diluted. Yet I volunteer at a Catholic charity, and load boxes and things onto shipping containers, two mornings a week. I’ve been doing this for years. I retired early, and can spare that much time for a good cause.
I have subscriptions to Scientific American and Nature (UK science/research magazine). My head does hurt sometimes when reading the last.
I keep tropical fish. After a lot of practice, I am still an amateur and only keep easy species.
I am a photographer of some ability. I’ve done two weddings (swore never again after the first one, it’s work!) but prefer arty outdoor scenes and travel photos. And anything my wife tells me to shoot: sometimes I execute better than she, but just don’t see the opportunities her eyes do. Uncredited images on this site are from my own camera.
I have degrees from University of Toronto. I worked in data processing for IBM and a large Canadian bank. I was once addressed as Mister Systems Architect by an IBM honcho of Finance Industry Marketing. I was fairly good at what I did. It was interesting and challenging.
One thing I learned from development projects is, the product belongs to the client and perhaps the company, but the results of the teamwork, including know-how and mutual respect, belong to the team.

Thus my interest in poetry. I’ve been in the team on earth for a while and have come to many observations. Now I am finding ways, in this new and open digital world, of sharing those more widely with others.
I trust each one of you may have a chance to profit from, or recognize, or laugh with or at, or maybe yell at, and sometimes respond to, some of these entries. They were written for us, that is, for you.