“Lucky Buddha to find a home in Jane Marla Robbins’ Topanga Canyon garden and have her take down his every wise word. Her poems will set you smiling, then laughing, then seeing, then smiling a deeper kind of smile. Step into her garden and make your day.'” -- John Guare, Pullitzer Prize winning playwright, House of Blue Leaves, Six Degrees of Separation

"Lively- cerebral-witty, yet filled with profound reflections, Robbins’ work reminds us that poetry can be both a celebration and an entertainment- not to mention food for thought." -- Patricia Bosworth, Vanity Fair, contributing editor; author of Anything Your Little Heart Desires and An American Family Story

“In these brightly lit and joy-filled poems, all inspired by a stone statue of the Laughing Buddha, Jane Marla Robbins practically dares the universe to bring her down, and it cannot do so. In poem after poem, laughter triumphs over whatever comes her way, and it is a literate, knowing laughter, a cosmic, Buddhist laughter that will make even the most jaded reader say with the poet, 'Okay, I’m smiling now./Okay, I’ll have fun. With you./FUN!’” --Gail Wronsky, poet, author of Blue Shadow Behind Everything Dazzling

"The great thing about Jane Marla Robbins is she conclusively proves that wisdom can be funny." --David Finkle, critic, New York Times Book Review; author, People Tell Me Things

“Laugh with these poems.... all saturated with the essence of the ancient wisdom of the Laughing Buddha.” -- Qiu Xiaolong, poet, translator, author, 100 Poems From Tang and Song Dynasties

“These poems touch heart and mind. They tickle, too, as well as possessing a unique power -- to transform all of us who read them into Laughing Buddhas ourselves” -- Enid Zuckerman, psychotherapist, LMSW, MA

“Laughter is one of the messages that the Buddha, ‘The Enlightened or Awakened One’, and so many other wise people teach us, and Jane’s wonderful book reminds us why. I recommend it to all of us who need more smiling and laughter in our lives.” -- Rabbi Stan Levy, congregation B’nai Horin

“Delve into Jane's musings with delight, nearly one for each week of the year. A cross between memoir, proverb and aphorism, these poems will charm and entice you with a new-found sense of delight and wonder at our crazy, crazy universe and our place within it.” -- Millicent Borges Accardi, CantoMundo and NEA fellow, author of Injuring Eternity and Woman on a Shaky Bridge