A sweet song from an uncaged poetic talent.
“Bird” is the word in this superb collection of verse.
Veteran author Crawford (The Names of Birds, 2011, etc.) opens one of the poems in this fine new volume with a quote from Emily Dickinson: “One note from / one bird / Is better than / a million words.” He seems to have gotten her message wrong, though, because this collection is made up of thousands of words about birds. Essentially, every piece refers at least once to our feathered friends, and in the hands of a lesser poet, such a project would be either quixotic or uninspired. In Crawford’s, however, it’s brilliant—a weird high-wire act in which each avian allusion becomes more difficult to pull off, and all the more impressive when it works. More often than not, his narrators’ comments on birds set up reflections on other, deeper themes, such as attraction to beauty; thus, in “Eden,” a hummingbird drawn to nectar becomes a personal symbol: “I was reminded of myself, / drunk the way I am on beauty. / When there’s sugar inside, / you keep trying.” Then, in “Little Man on Your Shoulder,” the song of unseen birds leads the speaker to ponder an Asian image of mortality: “In Korea where I once lived, / the monks liked to joke / about our coming and going. / It’s a little man on your shoulder, / they’d say, he’s always there / gently niggling you / about your impermanence.” At other times, though, a bird is just a bird, as in “What’s Certain”: “The Pinyon Jay / is always in charge. / He comes down hard / but seems to own / whatever he lands on / with several screeches / to make the point.” As the poet deftly links thoughts on nature, death, ecology, and religion, he may remind readers of the great Gary Snyder, although Crawford’s verse is a bit more approachable. Early on, he writes that “good art / is what you can get away with.” If that’s true, he can get away with just about anything.
A sweet song from an uncaged poetic talent.Pub Date: Nov. 15, 2014
ISBN: 978-1503003101
Page Count: 136
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: March 25, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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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