Paradise Found Book Signing with Diana Raab

Join us for a Book Signing with local poet & author, Diana Raab, MFA, PhD!

Presenting her latest poetry collection, “An Imaginary Affair: Poems Whispered to Neruda”

Saturday 2/11 , 3-5 p.m. at Paradise Found

“An Imaginary Affair: Poems Whispered to Neruda” is a collection of sensitive and sensuous poems for poets and non-poets who appreciate the challenges and intricacies of being human. The poems touch on key human elements, such as love, desire, passion, memory, loss, and gratitude. The poet celebrates the joys, and pains inherent to a woman’s heart, while honoring the wisdoms and tones of Pablo Neruda’s poetry. Some of the epistolary poems are directed to Neruda in response to his riveting poems.‍

Pick up your copy of “An Imaginary Affair: Poems Whispered to Neruda” at Paradise Found,

or Click here to purchase online!

Words of praise

“In this intimate collection of poems, Diana Raab pays tribute to the sensual physicality of Pablo Neruda’s work and to her own real and invented lives. With unvarnished honesty, An Imaginary Affair celebrates a woman’s heart and mind through a handful of odes, epistolary poems, and the idea that memory and anticipation can sustain and nourish us; even drinking a glowing hot toddy is transformed into a meditation on how an ordinary act can awaken desire.

Her unvarnished honesty gives equal attention to matters of mortality, where loss is lyrically considered (“…will you run from me / when trains sleep at their stations”), and also explored in the spirit of open curiosity (“How long does it take / for a pine casket to disintegrate / in this caving land…). These poems remind us that to be alive is to try and balance joy and lament, and how through this effort we more deeply inhabit the world and ourselves.”

~ Emma Trelles, author of Tropicalia and Poet Laureate of Santa Barbara

“An imaginary affair is more than a conversation with Neruda’s poems. In this book, Diana Raab unveils trauma, desire, her life experience (“I am ready to wave goodbye to memories/and bow to gratitude”), and her passionate, non-imaginary affair with poetry.

The language is sensual, synesthetic, and at the same time restrained, precise (“flecks of lemon rind float about this whiskey/swirled with honey from the bee that loves/that buzz you give me”).

With subtlety and determination An Imaginary Affair invites the reader to enter the intimacy of poetry; its wisdom (“And we move together slowly, one step/at a time toward another dance, another life”).

~ Mariano Zaro, author of Decoding Sparrows‍

Meet the Author

Diana Raab, MFA, PhD, is a poet, memoirist, and blogger, and the award-winning author of nine books. She has four poetry collections: Dear Anais: My Life in Poems for You, The Guilt Gene, Listening to Africa, and Lust. Her most recent creative endeavor, Conversation Cards for Meaningful Storytelling, can serve as poetry prompts. She frequently speaks and writes about the healing and transformative powers of writing prose and poetry. Visit her at: dianaraab.com.

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We also carry her wonderful creative guidebook, Writing for Bliss: A Seven-Step Plan for Telling Your Story and Transforming Your Life. With techniques and prompts for both the seasoned and novice writer, it will lead you to tap into your creativity through storytelling and poetry, examine how life-changing experiences can inspire writing, pursue self-examination and self-discovery through the written word, and, understand how published writers have been transformed by writing.