Paul D. Carroll didn't "rage against the dying of the night"- he laughed, and sang. These 30 amazing poems were written in the last 10 weeks of his life. As poet Roger Aplon says, "they are full-bodied, rollicking & downright flabbergasting." He continues, "these images dazzle the imagination while stitching the physical world to the metaphysical. "Poem" which begins: 'What if today the world . . .' where Paul entwines the images of the very concrete' physical world with suspiciously sacred & elusive images from dream & memory: the fox's face becomes the shaver's face in the mirror that takes him to his passport & Baudelaire & Marilyn Monroe & a party at the church & a jitterbug & the girl without a face & Jesus Christ & the mystery of the hand-carved dresser & mother like a fist & Harpo Marx in "A Night at the Opera" to the final uplifting reminder, both physical & spiritual, that water can become wine . . .
About the Author: A well-known poet, Paul D. Carroll was also known for his involvement with the Chicago Review and Big Table, which published several of the "Beat" writers in the Autumn 1958 issue. Censorship attempts were made against this writing by the University of Chicago and the U.S. Post Office. ACLU helped win an appeals trial lifting the ban against mailing Big Table Carroll edited four more Big Table issues from 1959-1960. He also pursued an academic career, lecturing at Notre Dame University (1952-1954) and University of Chicago (1954-1957). He taught at Loyola University from 1957-1959, . He worked for the magazine WFMT Perspective (precursor to Chicago magazine) . He was a Visiting Professor of Poetry at the Program in Creative Writing at the University of Iowa from 1966-1967 Starting in 1969, Carroll became a Professor of English at the University of Illinois Chicago, where he founded the Program for Writers, the school's graduate program for creative writing, in 1974. Carroll retired as Professor Emeritus in 1992. Carroll authored several books including The Satirical Letters of St. Jerome (1958), Odes (1968), The Poem in Its Skin (1968), The Luke Poems (1971), The Earthquake on Ada Street (1979), New and Selected Poems (1979), The Garden of Earthly Delights (1986), Poems and Psalms (1990), Chicago Tales (1991), and The Beaver Dam Road Poems (1994). He edited The Edward Dahlberg Reader (1967) and The Young American Poets (1968). From 1966-1971, he served as editor of the Big Table Series of Younger Poets for Follett Publishing Company. Besides a writer and professor, Carroll was a pioneer in bringing poetry to the larger Chicago community. In 1968, he organized poetry readings at the Museum of Contemporary Art, which developed into The Poetry Center in Chicago, in 1974. . He also hosted the WFMT radio show "The Name and Nature of Poetry" from 1974-1982. Carroll received the Chicago Poets Award in 1985 by Chicago's Office of Fine Arts, He received awards for his poems from the Illinois Arts Council in 1976 and 1981 and received Artists Grants from the Illinois Arts Council in 1983 and 1984. He has a son, Luke, who lives in Chicago, and a widow, Maryrose, who lives in the mountains in North Carolina.