The Beautiful Foolishness: Poems (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9781956375435)

Early in The Beautiful Foolishness is a tongue-in-cheek poem called "Ten Koans," but you quickly discover that there are far more koans in Wayne Lee's book than ten. In fact, the koan-that brief paradoxical statement used in Zen Buddhist meditation-runs throughout the book, as do Zen philosophies and haiku, of which there's an entire section. The point? To make you slow down and contemplate. Lee's poetry, widely published in journals and anthologies, here invites the reader into a world where these Asian poetic traditions meet the U.S. Southwest.