Poetry Book Reviews

Poignant and painful in its clarity, Crossing the Sea of Shattered Glass: A Voyage Through Grief by R.B. Bunn is a powerful collection of poetry that explores the universal experience of regret and loss.

Writing specifically about his uncle’s death and long struggle with addiction, Bunn’s poems range from deeply personal memories and anecdotal reflections to lyrical abstractions with dense metaphors about emotional processing. Pieces such as “Double-Edged Pill” and “The Price of a Bottle” are unflinching examinations of addiction and self-destruction, while “The Fishing Rod” and “Smoke” tenderly peel back the poet’s life and memory, as though longing for […]

A soul-baring collection of melancholy poetry, Always Something Heartfelt by Ashton Harper dives into the poet’s complex journey through desire, romance, and heartbreak.

Harper’s poetry swings from pleading and passionate appeals to broken and bitter reflections, anecdotal memories captured in nostalgic verse, and off-the-cuff pushbacks against unwanted emotions. The poetry matures as the book progresses, expanding into ponderings of negative energy, selfishness, regret, personal responsibility, and mental liberation, but the undercurrent ideas of intimacy and an existential quest for love is consistent. Versatile in tone, form, and energy, Harper is a gritty poet who revels in vulnerable confession.

From a […]

A haunting and heavy anthology of emotionally driven poems, Marching with a Broken Shadow by Dyson Russell is a wide-ranging collection that tackles romantic ironies, universal agonies, and the simple pleasures of existence.

From reflections on nature’s nuanced beauty to kaleidoscopic analyses of true love and loss, these poems are unafraid to expose the unadulterated marrow of human experience. There is an exploratory and questioning undercurrent, and while musings on death, purpose, and love are common, Russell has a uniquely experimental voice that will make readers sit up and take note.

The diversity of the poems’ subject matter, length, tone, […]