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Soul Feast is a companion to the hugely popular poetry anthology Soul Food, offering up a further feast of thoughtful poems to stir the mind and feed the spirit, bringing hope and light in dark, uncertain times.
The original Soul Food anthology (2007) achieved its wide popularity by word of mouth. For many thousands of readers feeling adrift in the early years of the 21st century, the poems in that book offered support and sustenance. This new compilation once again shows how poetry can help sustain our search for meaning in the face of even more destructive and disorientating events. All these poems are universal illuminations of the meaning of life, speaking to readers of all faiths as well as to seekers and non-believers.
Drawn from many traditions, Soul Feast includes work by poets ranging from Lal Ded and Tukaram to Pessoa, Borges, Cummings and Langston Hughes, as well as poems by celebrated contemporary poets such as Ellen Bass, Imtiaz Dharker, Jane Hirshfield and Naomi Shihab Nye. This is a book to keep by the bedside or to keep with you when travelling.
"Consolation is a rare quality in our tragic times, but sometimes poetry can provide a sanctuary. Bloodaxe Books, which often sets a creative pace in poetry publishing, offers 'nourishing poems of hope and light' in its anthology Soul Feast. This gathers roughly 100 poets from many countries into an ambitious collection, edited by the Bloodaxe founder Neil Astley, and the artist, filmmaker, and translator Pamela Robertson-Pearce. Each poem feels chosen with intelligence and care: accessibility matches profundity. […] a searching anthology that is both elegy, and celebration."—Martin Halsall, Church Times
"Soul Food is an extremely attractive book. Of all the books lying about my house, more visitors have been drawn to wanting to borrow this than any other... It contains work by many of my favourite poets, but more importantly it whets my appetite with new discoveries... I recommend buying copies to keep and give away."—Chris Kinsey, Envoi‘
"In the end, the proof of a Soul Feast has to be in the eating, and I’ve got to admit that, even for an old cynic like me, the whole experience of sitting down and partaking was actually, well… ‘nourishing’."—Stuart Henson, London Grip
"Editors Neil Astley (Bloodaxe founder and editor) and Pamela Robertson-Pearce gracefully bring together different cultures, religions and poetry styles through a glorious mix of both contemporary voices, such as Imtiaz Dharker, Jane Clarke and Jane Hirshfield, and the likes of 14th century Kashmiri mystic Lal Ded, Jorge Luis Borges and Langston Hughes. […] Poems, then, to heal, rejoice in and share."—Dawn Gorman, Caduceus, on Soul Feast
"These poems illuminate the path of life."—Rachel Campbell-Johnston, The Times, on Soul Food
Neil Astley and Pamela Robertson-Pearce are co-editors of the Bloodaxe anthologies Soul Food (2007) and Soul Feast (2024), and collaborated on the DVD-books In Person: 30 Poets (2008) and In Person: World Poets (2017).
Neil Astley is editor of Bloodaxe Books which he founded in 1978. His books include many anthologies, most notably those in the Staying Alive series: Staying Alive (2002), Being Alive (2004), Being Human (2011) and Staying Human (2020).
Pamela Robertson-Pearce is an artist, filmmaker and translator. Her films include Imago: Meret Oppenheim (1996), on the artist who made the fur-lined teacup, and Gifted Beauty (2000), about Surrealist women artists including Leonora Carrington and Remedios Varo.
Lorna Crozier 11 Packing for the Future: Instructions
Mary O’Donnell 13 The Intimate Future
Julius Chingono 14 As I Go
Jericho Brown 15 Crossing
Stanisłav Baranczak 16 If china
William Stafford 17 The Way It Is
Toon Tellegen 17 ‘I drew a line…’
Ruth Stone 18 Train Ride
Tomas Tranströmer 19 Tracks
Ted Kooser 20 November 12: 4.30 a.m.
Kerry Hardie 21 We Go On
Lal Ded 22 Two poems
2. SOUL SEARCH
Jane Hirshfield 23 Counting, New Year’s Morning, What Powers Yet Remain to Me
Kona Macphee 25 The Gift
Denise Levertov 25 The Gift
Arun Kolatkar 26 Yeshwant Rao
Tukaram 28 ‘When he comes…’
Kathleen Ossip 30 The Believer
Dennis O’Driscoll 31 Fabrications
Edward Hirsch 35 I Was Never Able to Pray
Giorgio Caproni 36 Prayer
Arundhathi Subramaniam 37 Prayer
Jorge Luis Borges 38 Poem Written in a Copy of Beowulf
Peter Sirr 39 A Saxon Primer
Lucie Brock-Boido 40 Soul Keeping Company
Adriana Lisboa 41 Soul Washing
May Swenson 42 Question
3. LIFE ON EARTH
Denise Levertov 43 O Taste and See
Linda Pastan 44 Imaginary Conversation
Muriel Rukeyser 45 Yes
Gregory Orr 46 To Be Alive
Rosemary Tonks 47 Addiction to an Old Mattress
Maya C. Popa 48 Dear Life
Marin Sorescu 49 With Only One Life
John McCullogh 50 Watermelon Man
Ada Limón 51 Love Poem with Apologies for My Appearance
Jack Hirschman 52 Path
Jack Gilbert 53 A Brief for the Defense
Ellen Bass 54 The Thing Is
Ellen Bass 55 Any Common Desolation
Joan Margarit 56 Love Is a Place
Jane Hirshfield 57 A Cedary Fragrance
Chase Twichell 58 Saint Animal
Mona Arshi 59 Little Prayer
William Stafford 60 Listening
Tuvia Ruebner 61 Wonder
Jeong Ho-seung 62 A Spider
Jane Hirshfield 63 The Supple Deer
Jane Hirshfield 64 The Envoy
Lynne Wycherley 65 The Substitute Sky
Marie Howe 66 Postscript
4. ALL TOGETHER NOW
Fernando Pessoa 67 They Spoke to Me of People, and of Humanity.
Vincent Katz 68 This Beautiful Bubble
Naomi Shihab Nye 70 Gate A-4
Imtiaz Dharker 72 How to Cut a Pomegranate
Imtiaz Dharker 73 Crab-apples
John Koethe 74 Lives
Tomas Tranströmer 75 After Someone’s Death
Taha Muhammad Ali 76 Maybe
A.E. Housman 77 ‘Good creatures…’
Tomas Tranströmer 78 Alone
Jeong Ho-seung 80 To Daffodils
Sandra McPherson 81 Some Meanings of Silence
John O’Donohue 82 from For the Break-up of a Relationship
Naomi Shihab Nye 82 The Art of Disappearing
Lee Young-ju 84 Lumberjack Diary
Naomi Shihab Nye 85 Shoulders
Lauren Halderman 86 from Instead of Dying
Chen Chen 87 a small book of questions: chapter VII
Mary Jean Chan 90 Conversation with a Fantasy Mother
Jane Clarke 91 Spalls
Sandra Cisneros 92 At Fifty I Am Startled to Find I Am in My Splendor
Doug Anderson 93 Homage to Li Po
Alicia Ostriker 94 Wrinkly Lady Dancer
Lucille Clifton 95 homage to my hips
Norigo Ibaragi 96 When I Was at My Most Beautiful
Norigo Ibaragi 98 Your Own Sensitivity at Least
Linda Pastan 99 I Am Learning to Abandon the World
Joy Harjo 100 I Am a Prayer
5. HOPE & LIGHT
Imtiaz Dharker 102 Carving
Kerry Hardie 103 Flesh
Alyson Hallett 104 Suddenly, Everything
E.E. Cummings 105 ‘i thank You God for most this amazing’
Edip Cansever 106 Table
Elena Shvarts 107 ‘Set your course by the Sun…’
Imtiaz Dharker 108 Living Space
Brendan Kennelly 109 Permission
Adam Zagajewski 109 Wake Up
Danusha Laméris 110 Insha’Allah
Miroslav Holub 111 The door
Roger Robinson 112 A Portable Paradise
Boris A. Novak 113 Decisions: II
Ivan V. Lalc 114 The Spaces of Hope
Lisel Muller 115 Hope
Enda Coyle-Greene 116 Hope
Edith Södergran 117 Hope
Ellen Cranitch 118 Hope
Ai Qing 119 The Lamp
Samuel Menashe 119 Now
Langston Hughes 120 Dreams
Langston Hughes 120 Harlem [2]
Brendan Kennelly 121 Good Souls to Survive
Molly Fisk 122 Against Panic
Michael D. Higgins 123 The Well 2
Leanne O’Sullivan 124 A Healing
Paula Meehan 125 Seed
Derek Mahon 126 Everything Is Going To Be All Right
127 Notes on the poets
153 Acknowledgements
159 Index of writers