Books 📚

Bum Knees and Grieving Sunsets
FlowerSong Press 2023

This book is what the sun would say if it were to take a deep breath while looking down on humanity and then shining a spotlight on its exhalation. It’s where we ask if getting older is simply our rite of passage or a record of our passages we write. It’s the soundtrack of bones learning to listen to the creak as we move from one part of life into another and the wisdom that can only be obtained through the missteps. This book is the snagged line drive we thought would be a hit and how we handle the next at-bat. This book demands justice and rallies against oppression. This book of poems chronicles the leaps of faith we take, careful not to leave out the landing.

In Bum Knees and Grieving Sunsets, Daniel Romo offers incisive commentary on modern life, from the perspective of a father, spouse, teacher, sports fan, and observer of the world at its best and worst. Whether he’s watching a child attempt to throw strikes, thinking about faith in the midst of an everyday scene, or pondering the power of muscle memory, Romo’s speaker is a steady guide, unafraid to approach tough questions. Replete with wit, irony, and play, these poems leave the reader in a place of contemplation, as in “Proof of Life” we’re told, “We do the best with what we can and call it / learning. // We hug our own bodies tight and call it / damage control.” — Mary Biddinger, author of Department of Elegy

Moonlighting as an Avalanche
2021 Tebot Bach

In Moonlighting as an Avalanche, Daniel Romo’s poems plumb the worthy mysteries of love, faith, failure, change, who we were, and who we might become. “There is no graceful way to gut the twilight,” he writes, but his work does just that, probing those moments when the sun seems to set, appraising them with honesty, and rendering them with deep beauty. Part marvel, part mirror, this is a book of continual surprise.  — Ashley Farmer, author of The Women

Apologies in Reverse
FutureCycle Press 2019

Waving goodbye to any past requires re-examining lands of inadequacies. It’s once again exploring worlds where losing your footing becomes the normal way of walking. It’s where haunting memories are made and not able to be forgotten. It’s where 90’s MTV meets racial inequality. It’s where razor-sharp imagery and wit dissect the guts of a man who knows his reflection in mirrors is all too honest. It’s where this book of prose poems finally puts it all behind by saying so long, forever… but not really. (sample poems from the book)

It’s my pleasure to welcome Daniel Romo’s newest collection, “Apologies in Reverse,” into the distinguished canon of American prose poetry. Whether contemplating the social and political discord of the 1990s or chronicling the turbulent journey from teenager to man to poet, these finely crafted treasures are ambitious. There’s a fierceness here, tempered by an abundance of wit and wisdom, empathy and eloquence. Romo has mastered how to “speak a language” that pulls him from “the sidelines,” and we’re more than ready to “listen and take notes.” This is a book to read, reread, and remember!  — Mary Koncel

 

When Kerosene’s Involved 
Mojave River Press 2014

Surrender the sweater vest, lose the loafers, pop the collar. These are not your grandfather’s prose poems. Nor are they your father’s. They belong to a new generation. A generation that values poetic craft, fresh language, and images that burn. These prose poems maintain a controlled, consistent voice, despite the many colorful subjects explored. Fairy tales go awry, pop culture is pimped out, lovers take leaps of faith that can only end in injury. Surreal worlds and crisp words create an artful violence that’s vital like oxygen. The voice of these poems commands your attention. He walks up to you, looks you in the eye and socks your gut and guts your socks. And you are winded, and you look at him, and he simply walks away. And you realize, you liked it. ​(sample poem from the book)

The prose poems in Daniel Romo’s debut collection read like trees and trees of scorched photographs: hot, fragmented, and alive like leaves. Walking through this strange forest is the poet on fire asking, “What if there is no heaven?” Asking, “Why?” Asking for prayer, and surrender, and the faces in the ash to come back all at once. These poems shake like a world up in smoke, and mourning for beauty.  — Sabrina Orah Mark

 

Romancing Gravity
Silver Birch Press 2013

The poems in Romancing Gravity navigate through worlds (and words) nestled in nostalgia, rooted in the uncanny, and prime with pain. Striking language and rich images frame gangbangers, classrooms, and family, while trying to carry the burdens that come with being alive. These are poems of baseball and breathing, of heaven and healing. The speakers of the poems wander from one world and into the next, looking down to find their footing, and looking up for proof that they exist.  (sample poem from the book)

Daniel Romo’s Romancing Gravity is a terrific collection—at once edgy, comical, and big-hearted.  I was immediately drawn to his streetwise grit, his luminous vision of urban America. These are poems that swagger, that “boom-boom sound” and leave your ears ringing. — David Hernandez