The premise of Ten Poems to Change Your Life by Roger Housden is this: great poems can be dangerous. They can make you question your assumptions, change your direction, and find the courage to start over. I believe that reading can lead to reflection that inspires transformation. In fact, I’m in the process changing the direction of my life now, and the “call to action”in these poems resonates with me. In some cases, they articulate things that I almost believe that I was on the verge of discovering myself. The poetry here doesn’t provide answers, but it can summon discovery.
Roger Housden, Ten Poems to Change Your Life (Harmony Books, Random House Inc., New York, 2001), p. 89.