Wheel of Water invites readers into a lifetime of observation, reflection, and poetic discovery. Written by David Baldwin, the collection gathers the finest work from a long creative journey shaped by family history, sacred music, haiku and tanka, the rhythms of faith, and the ordinary moments that reveal the deepest truths of human life.
The book traces poetry not as a sudden calling, but as a quiet presence that grew steadily over time. Baldwin’s relationship with poetry began through teaching, reading, and private reflection before eventually becoming a disciplined creative practice. At forty-five, his first poem found its way into print. Later, as a technical writer, he filled notebooks with vivid fragments of daily life, transforming brief observations into poems marked by precision, memory, humor, and emotional honesty. At sixty, his work with haiku and tanka brought new focus to his writing and led to publication in respected poetry journals and anthologies.
What makes Wheel of Water especially moving is the breadth of life it contains. The collection moves through childhood memories, family relationships, marriage, parenting, aging, loss, work, war, nature, social conscience, and spiritual questioning. Poems such as those in the “Family Memories” section look back on parents, childhood homes, Navy life, school years, and the complicated emotional inheritance of family. Other sections, including “Observations,” “Haiku and Tanka,” and “Conscience,” expand outward into nature, public life, faith, morality, and the search for meaning in a changing world.
Baldwin’s poetry is both intimate and wide-ranging. His voice can be tender, humorous, sharp, reflective, and spiritually searching, often within the space of a few lines. He writes with the eye of someone trained to notice detail and the heart of someone willing to revisit memory without pretending it is simple. His work does not reduce life to easy conclusions. Instead, it allows readers to sit with uncertainty, gratitude, grief, wonder, and renewal.
The collection also reflects Baldwin’s rich and varied life. Recently retired from the Walt Disney Company as a senior technical writer in its global technology division in Seattle, he has also worked for Boeing, Microsoft, Hewlett-Packard, and Amazon. His background includes experience as a naval officer, college English professor, real estate broker, technical writing author, and masters track and field athlete. A longtime poet, Baldwin served as national secretary for the Haiku Society of America in 2009. Wheel of Water is his fifth book of poetry.
This book will appeal to readers of poetry, memoir, faith-inspired writing, haiku, family history, and reflective literature. It offers not only a collection of poems, but a record of a life carefully observed and honestly rendered. Readers who appreciate poetry rooted in memory, spiritual reflection, human complexity, and the small details that shape a lifetime will find Wheel of Water both thoughtful and deeply rewarding.
Wheel of Water is available now in print and digital formats
