"Carolyn Hopper's Connections is artfully convergent. From faraway to close by; in adoration of wildness and by admissions of affection for every other living being, her words bring together passion and purpose across continents and countries, over landscapes and through conversations with assorted living beings. Poetry and prose meld-connecting us to her world of wonder." -J Drew Lanham, 2022 Poet Laureate Fellow and award-winning author of The Home Place: Memoirs of a Colored Man's Love Affair with Nature ¿¿¿¿¿¿Fall in love with the wild in this beautifully crafted collection of poems and essays. ¿¿¿Carolyn Keith Hopper has a deep appreciation of and love for the natural world-whether in the mountain forests around her home in Montana or on the Galápagos Islands, where living beings as old and strange as time invite her into their sphere. Sometimes it's a monastery bell atop towering fingers of rock or a bird song hidden in a jungle that inspires her work. Other times it's the silence and scent of the forest after a rain, or the excitement of racing across rolling prairie. Lyrical and perceptive, the poems and essays in Connections will inspire you to spend time in nature, to catch the songs of bears, forests, and rivers. Hopper's fourth book transports you to places across the globe and invites you to experience the beauty of the wild.