Let Your Tears Water the Earth. This item is unavailable.Let Your Tears Water the Earth

Let Your Tears Water the Earth is Gus Speth's fifth book of poems and similar writings. It is at once his most personal and his most political.

Speth says his poetry captures his thinking better than the many other things he has written. His title here reflects the massive contradictions of our current situation, and yet it leaves a glimmer of genuine hope for regeneration. Toward the end of this volume, he reminds us of Shelley's statement that "poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world." Asked about this recently, Speth replied, "We wish!"

Gus Speth, a writer of non-fiction and poetry, retired not long ago as dean of the Yale School of the Environment and as professor at the Vermont Law and Graduate School. Previously, he served in the United Nations and in the Administration of Jimmy Carter, and he helped to found the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and the World Resources Institute (WRI), both of which, he says, flourished after he left. He is a fellow at the Wellbeing Economy Alliance and the Democracy Collaborative. Speth and his wife Cameron (Cece) and their dogs Folly and Callie divide their time between central Vermont and coastal South Carolina and will continue doing so as long as he and the dogs can hop in and out of the car.