Scant need to explain the theme. Here we have a wistful reflection, one of the attendants of faith. The question of evil is difficult enough; here we touch upon the divine conscience. And it’s even in an almost 10-9 meter, save for the final line. Almost.
Samuel in the Quantum Field: How One Boy’s Holocaust Story Can Help Us Bridge Space, Time, and Everything In Between – An interview with author Elyn Joy
The author of Samuel in the Quantum Field talks about the inspiration for her book, her research and transcription process, her unique, physics approach, the book’s relationship a Sioux City railroad memorial exhibit called Desperate Passages, and lots more.
A review of Owning the Not So Distant World by Grace Cavalieri
Grace Cavalieri is by turns as sagacious and oblique as a Zen koan, her verses brimming with aphoristic wisdom, and also charmingly chatty, like your best friend in the world, oscillating between aloof and intimate but always appealing.
A review of Little River of Amazement by Mary Kay Rummel
Mary Kay Rummel’s universe is vast, but as “Ars Poetica” spells out, she focuses on the world around her with a keen attention to detail. The title, indeed, says it all.Little River of Amazement comes from one of the new poems, “December Bodies,” in the first of her two-part suite of new work, For the Speechless World.
Revenge Follows Function: A review of The Inhabitants by Beth Castrodale
In this entertaining and creative novel, Castrodale smartly weaves together modern and classical literary takes on potions and tonics, nature and nurture, motherhood and friendship, grieving and healing, and the perils of trusting the wrong people while distrusting one’s own instincts.
A review of Zero at the Bone by Christian Wiman
Poetry gives suffering form, and giving suffering form is an antidote to despair. Yet content matters, too. For Wiman, much confessionalism is “an idolatry of suffering…an outrage that no person (or group) has suffered as we have, or simply a solipsistic withdrawal that leaves us maniacally describing every detail of our cells.
Mary Pacifico Curtis and Sybil Baker In Conversation
The authors of Understanding Moonseed and Apparitions chat about their books, inspirations, their settings and the importance of place, process, spirituality, ghosts, magic realism, the impact of covid, and much more.
A review of Lucky by Jane Smiley
Smiley’s underlying theme, however, is the precariousness of this immortality. While presenting Jodie’s maturation as a woman and artist, she quietly notes some major historic events of the passing era.
A review of Therapon by Dan Beachy-Quick and Bruce Bond
Throughout this masterful book of collaborative poetry, the theme of Otherness is explored, whether through naming the nameless or gathering and disseminating the knowledge that the naming gives us.
A review of The Homesick Mortician by Peter Mladinic
There is an urgency to this breaking down of line structure, often bridged by run-on thoughts strung together by comma fasteners. It is a compelling style, one that makes the collection very readable at a quick clip. In some cases, as with the first poem, structure reasserts itself at the end with a strong strike upon the bell of reality: “They brought him home.”