David Wolk Budbill (born 1940, Cleveland, Ohio) is an American poet, and playwright.
He is the author of six books of poems, eight plays, a novel, a collection of short stories, a picture book for children, and dozens of essays, introductions, speeches, and book reviews. Zen Mountains/Zen Streets, an audio CD of his poetry, with the music of jazz bassist and composer William Parker, was released on the Boxholder Records label. He has also served as an occasional commentator on National Public Radio's All Things Considered.
He is the creator and editor of The Judevine Mountain Emailite: a Cyberzine: an On-Line and On-Going Journal of Politics and Opinion, which is available on his website . In 2000, Budbill wrote the libretto for an opera, with music by composer Erik Nielsen, called A Fleeting Animal: An Opera from Judevine, which is based on two characters from the Judevine poems. A Fleeting Animal premiered in Vermont in October 2000 to rave reviews and packed houses.
While We’ve Still Got Feet (Copper Canyon Press, 2005) is his latest collection of poems. Inspired by ancient Chinese and Japanese reclusive poets, Budbill continues a discourse about his struggles living a simple life in a complex modern time.
He lives in the mountains or northern Vermont with his wife, painter Lois Eby; their daughter is the poet Nadine Wolf Budbill.His papers are held at University of Vermont.
Among his prizes and honors are a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship in playwriting, a 1982 Guggenheim Fellowship in poetry, and a Dorothy Canfield Fisher Award for fiction. .
’’Zen Mountains-Zen Streets: A Duet for Poet and Improvised Bass’’ (with bassist William Parker) (Boxholder Records, 1999)
’’Songs for a Suffering World: A Prayer for Peace, a Protest Against War’’ (with bassist William Parker and drummer Hamid Drake)(Boxholder Records, 2003)