Driving off the Horizon
My first book, Driving Off the Horizon, was a collection of poetry published by a small Maryland press (IM Press) in 1996. It was actually my MFA thesis manuscript, a collection of poems written in my 20s as I lived in different cities and traveled the world. These are poems of a person yearning for purpose and direction, for love and life, sharing fears, desires, concerns and celebrations on a path toward independence.
Praise for this book
“Lynne Cohn provides a fresh voice in contemporary poetry. She explores what it means to be a young American Jewish woman in the last decades of the 20th century. Her poetry takes her readers from the rolling hills of Virginia farmlands to the rugged landscapes of the Middle East.” Jane Elkington Wohl, Ph.D.
“Using gentle, impressionistic associations, Lynne Cohn’s poetry evokes the freedom of youth and a rich reservoir of memory. The promise of tomorrow and the energy of today are conveyed in all their complexity. Reading Lynne is rewarding for any age group.” Dr. Linda Bayer, Washington Jewish Week
“We know so much that we have begun to forget,” Lynne Cohn concludes in After the Bombs. Hers is the generation unshielded from the news. “Where does one walk after a bombing?” the poem asks. Perhaps into the intense focus of the living moment – “as if you were a newborn…/as if the only thing I could focus on/was trying not to drop you.” Gathering up the present. Claiming it and her own life through these poems.” Myra Sklarew
“Lynne Cohn is a promising young writer with a flair for capturing the essence of life and Judaism with passion.” Robin Schwartz-Kreger, B’nai B’rith International
“The way Lynne Cohn’s poems fuse longing with history makes them political. Yet, they are joyous and heartbreaking and discover their true subjects at the turning point of different kinds of faith. They are poems that prove something we didn’t know about the world.” Michael Klein
Living Inside: The Poetry of Prayer
This chapbook of poems was inspired by the Amidah, the Jewish daily prayer that includes nineteen blessings that religious Jews recite three times each day. The prayers include praises, thanks, and requests to the Creator. Traditionally, Jews say them standing up, facing the direction of Jerusalem. Each poem in this collection is based on a specific blessing.