Pier 40 by Joyce Englander Levy

“Joyce Englander Levy is a cartographer of the soul, mapping the alleyways of motherhood, ambition, and identity with a quiet ferocity. Pier 40 is a meditation on walking the tightrope between holding on and letting go. Levy navigates the push and pull of family life and professional longing, capturing the tension in each footstep, each breath. This is a book where the mundane is sacred, where the everyday struggle to find peace itself becomes a mantra. Pier 40 is as much about the city as it is about the heart—a road toward understanding oneself.”

–Karan Kapoor, Editor-In-Chief of Only Poems

Reading Joyce Englander Levy’s Pier 40, I keep thinking of St. Augustine’s maxim, Solvitur ambulando, “It is solved by walking.” The converse rhythm of walking is central to the book, a long sequence of tercets tracing an extraordinarily alert consciousness reckoning with the immediate and far-reaching matters of the day. The speaker and her two sons set their course west on 12th St. toward the Hudson River. Destination: soccer practice. The city becomes a playground. The sons spring off the infrastructure, invent games, plumb the imaginative possibilities of crosswalks. And for Levy too, the poem itself, with its agility, uncanny grace and ingenuity, its vaults and leaps, its forthright vulnerability, is a kind of parkour – a way through, for today.

–Genine Lentine, Author, Poet, Teacher and Interdisciplinary Artist

“From the opening poem and throughout this powerful collection, Joyce Englander Levy strikes a delicate balance between celebrating the splendor of the world we inhabit and acknowledging the grief and challenges we all face in our post-pandemic world. This book is a love song to New York, celebrating motherhood, the unique experiences of childhood, womanhood, and how we connect with ourselves, each other, and the world. Pier 40 is a heart-opening and mind-sharpening collection—a true gem.”

–Lisa Weinert, author of Narrative Healing: Awaken the Power of Your Story