Masterful poems from a seasoned writer.
Rewak’s (The Right Taxi, 2012) latest collection showcases the work of a skilled poet near the peak of his powers.
The poet, a Jesuit priest, spent years as a university president, and readers could create a classics course by tracking down all the allusions in his exquisite verse. All the greats are here—Shakespeare, Blake, Sophocles, Wordsworth—filling and animating Rewak’s balanced lines. He also pays homage to more recent luminaries: A tribute to the late, great Ansel Adams, for example, praises the photographer’s ability to match weight with airiness: “All those mountains / with the tonnage of centuries / suddenly leap / in magic / how you’ve subverted / gravity to show us / the lightness of creation.” Rewak successfully conveys a similar tension in his own poetry. While he addresses subjects that are, by turns, serious and light, his gravitas is never ponderous, and his levity never lacks substance. On one page, he meditates on the old myth that Jesus crafted his own cross using the carpentry skills he learned from Joseph: “the home he built / stands on Golgotha / you could not know / how he would use / your gift.” Switching gears just a handful of pages later, the poet wonders at the meter an ant would use if he talked in verse: “He spoke, / at first, in accents Chaucerian—I sensed / a primordial de-bump…but then / changed to the chittering of a pious Pound.” Only a talented writer can pull off such radical shifts in topic and tone, and Rewak does it all in free verse that never devolves into the lazier cant of lesser stylists. Best of all, his poetry rewards rereading, as images that at first seem merely clever have a depth that only reveals itself the second or third time around. In a touching meditation on Psalm 46, he asks, “Forgive me, Lord, for being mundane.” A funny request, since Rewak never is.
Masterful poems from a seasoned writer.Pub Date: March 14, 2014
ISBN: 978-1495382161
Page Count: 126
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: May 27, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
PERSPECTIVES
Therapeutic, moving verse from a promising new talent.
Keridan’s poetry testifies to the pain of love and loss—and to the possibility of healing in the aftermath.
The literary critic Geoffrey Hartman once wrote that literature—and poetry, in particular—can help us “read the wound” of trauma. That is, it can allow one to express and explain one’s deepest hurts when everyday language fails. Keridan appears to have a similar understanding of poetry. She writes in “Foreword,” the opening work of her debut collection, that “pain frequently uses words as an escape route / (oh, how I know).” Many words—and a great deal of pain—escape in this volume, but the result is healing: “the ending is happy / the beginning was horrific / so let’s start there.” The book, then, tracks the process of recovery in the wake of suffering, and often, this suffering is brought on by romantic relationships gone wrong. An early untitled poem opens, “I die a little / taking pieces of me to feed the fire / that keeps him warm / you don’t notice that it’s a slow death / when you’re disappearing little by little.” The author’s imagery here—of the self fueling the dying fire of love—is simultaneously subtle and wrenching. But the poem’s message, amplified elsewhere in the book, is clear: We go wrong if we destructively give ourselves over to others, and healing comes only when we turn our energies back to our own good. Later poems, therefore, reveal that self-definition often equals strength. The process is painful but salutary; when “you’re left unprotected / surrounded by chaos with nothing you / can depend on / except yourself / and that’s when you gather the pieces / of the life you lost / and use them to build the life you want.” The “life you want” is an elusive goal, and the author knows that the path to self-definition is fraught with peril—but her collection may give strength to those who walk it.
Therapeutic, moving verse from a promising new talent.Pub Date: Nov. 2, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-72770-538-6
Page Count: 196
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Jan. 9, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Downbeat but often engaging poems and stories.
A slim volume of largely gay-themed writings with pessimistic overtones.
Poe (Simple Simon, 2013, etc.) divides this collection of six short stories and 34 poems into five sections: “Art,” “Death,” “Relationship,” “Being,” and “Reflection.” Significantly, a figurative death at the age of 7 appears in two different poems, in which the author uses the phrase “a pretended life” to refer to the idea of hiding one’s true nature and performing socially enforced gender roles. This is a well-worn trope, but it will be powerful and resonant for many who have struggled with a stigmatized identity. In a similar vein, “Imaginary Tom” presents the remnants of a faded relationship: “Now we are imaginary friends, different in each other’s thoughts, / I the burden you seek to discard, / you the lover I created from the mist of longing.” Once in a while, short story passages practically leap off of the page, such as this evocative description of a seedy establishment in Lincoln, Nebraska: “It was a dimly lit bar that smelled of rodent piss, with barstools that danced on uneven legs and made the patrons wonder if they were drunker than they thought.” In “Valéry’s Ride,” Poe examines the familial duties that often fall to unmarried and childless people, keeping them from forming meaningful bonds with others. In this story, after the double whammy of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita hits Louisiana, Valéry’s extended family needs him more than ever; readers will likely root for the gay protagonist as he makes the difficult decision to strike out on his own. Not all of Poe’s main characters are gay; the heterosexual title character in “Mrs. Calumet’s Workspace,” for instance, pursues employment in order to escape the confines of her home and a passionless marriage. Working as a bookkeeper, she attempts to carve out a space for herself, symbolized by changes in her work area. Still, this story echoes the recurring theme of lives unlived due to forces often beyond one’s control.
Downbeat but often engaging poems and stories.Pub Date: Nov. 16, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-5168-3693-2
Page Count: 120
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: March 5, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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