Kyle D. Craig

Kyle Craig’s debut collection, Invisible Tea, carries the reader from thoughtfulness to wry humor, into the natural world and into photographs. Kyle is equally at home in Japanese forms such as haiku and haibun and in Western free verse.

In “The Only Photo of My Wife With Her Father,” Kyle captures the intricacies of the father- daughter relationship, even when the child is very young:

Look once and his arm is a seatbelt of skin and bone that fastens her to the seat of his body, keeps her from toppling towards ruin. Look again and she is a paper weight that tethers him to earth, without which he would soar and melt into the blue of sky, leave her to walk forever alone and against the wind.

Kyle depicts his relationship with his own young daughter in other poems, such as “My Buddhist Lessons,” which was inspired by a poem by David Shumate. Kyle has a special talent for writing poems inspired by other poets, which offers readers the additional pleasure of discovering or rediscovering the original poet’s work.

In addition to his family and his professional life, Kyle is active in the local and international haiku communities and the local poetry scene, teaching classes at the Indiana Writers Center and supporting his fellow authors. He is that rare combination we seek of fine poet and good person.

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-Tracy Mishkin (author of the chapbook The Night I Quit Flossing)