A down-to-earth collection of poems and translations on subjects that cover literary terrain ranging from Vermont to ancient...
A book of the author’s original verse along with his translations of works by Horace and three French Renaissance poets.
As the title implies, this debut collection has two sections. The first, “Vermont, Oregon and Elsewhere: Selected Poems,” consists of poems the author wrote mainly in the last three decades of the 20th century. These poems tend to describe simple pleasures in clear language and concrete images, such as a reference to “olive-fat mosquitoes,” a well-turned phrase in “Mediterranean.” Other works in the first part of the book have titles that suggest their subjects, including “Night Spider,” “Moon,” “Vermont Sun” and “Oregon Rain.” In this section, Malamud occasionally experiments with free verse but more often uses traditional rhyme schemes, as in “Corvallis, 1957,” which deals with a cherished childhood memory of dusk spent in good company: “With unbound energy and breath, I race / laughing and screaming, braking in the dirt — / my friend, a blurred old bike and pale face — / the night air rippling in my cotton shirt.” The narrator of the poem, basking in the exhilarating freedom of youth, then heads home, “happiness pinned like medals to my chest.” The second part of the collection, “Ten From Horace, Three From The French,” has the author’s translations of some of the ancient Roman poet’s odes and of one work from each of three writers of the French Renaissance. This part of the book begins by mentioning some of the challenges of translating poetry, such as whether or not to preserve meter and rhyme, and explaining how the author dealt with them. It then offers a brief introduction to Horace and his times, written in a conversational style: “Much of his poetry consists of criticism of luxury and poor taste, and he is given to reminding wealthy friends in verse, that they are going to die soon. Yet, his satire has a laid-back, jovial quality.” Modern readers may especially relate to an ode that urges people to seize the day because they do not know what the future holds. Similarly, the author’s translation of Jean Vauquelin de la Fresnaye’s poem “Déja, venant hérissonné” conveys the universal uneasiness that often accompanies the approach of winter.
A down-to-earth collection of poems and translations on subjects that cover literary terrain ranging from Vermont to ancient Rome.Pub Date: Oct. 9, 2013
ISBN: 978-1490946443
Page Count: 76
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Jan. 28, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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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