Poetry Book Reviews

Gary Burns’ Bridges: To There is an evocative collection of poetry, but lacks the visceral immediacy of his earlier collections of meditative poetry, such as Clouds: On the Wind.

Within the first of the four sections, the poems contain the same mixture of Haiku-esque observation, yet contain a childlike rhyme scheme. For example, in  “The Wind All About”:

In the trees, with ease
The bird flees the stir of leaves
When the spirit of the wind
Stirs us
Go we must

The effect this has is to draw the reader away from the actual words and images and focuses […]

Clouds: On the Wind is another lovely book of poetry by Gary Burns, adding another naturalistic collection to his oeuvre.

Splitting the collection into four parts – “Clouds Moonlit,” “Cloudy Day Doorway,” “Windswept,” “Wind Song” – was an ingenious idea by Burns, as it has the effect of moving the reader through space, from night into day, as if on a gust of wind. The illustrations at the beginning of each poem are also a delight, and enhance the imagery, rather than leading the reader.

The opening poem, “Quietly There You Be,” is a tone-setter. An undercurrent of longing runs […]

In Garden Walks: Hand in Hand, poet Gary W. Burns has crafted a beautiful collection that acts as a vivid and meditative appreciation of love between people, and the love of nature.

Burns achieves the semblance of a whole through splitting the collection into four parts: “Colorful Blooms,” “This Backyard Garden,” “Garden Paths,” and “Seasons Cascading.” Each part seems to mirror the constituent parts of a flower’s life – it buds, grows, blooms, and dies. There is a symbiosis between human relationships and nature, exploring love seen through the lens of the natural world.

The most affecting poems are […]

In her debut collection of poetry, A Frostbitten Memory of a Stillborn Spring, Lindy Kennedy shows an admirable talent for describing life’s vicissitudes with sensitivity.

Kennedy expresses in the introduction her intention to capture “eternal pairs” – highs and lows, beginnings and ends – reflected in the book’s three sections: People and Love, Things and Time, and Places and Ambition. Kennedy uses a clever turn of phrase when she’s at her best, as in “Where Are You?” which wryly asks, “If it’s over, where did ‘it’ go?” There is the quiet exhortation in the aptly titled “Life Lived Leaves […]

Love Crimes is a raw and moving collection of poems about relationships by debut poet Sayde Scarlett.

Largely consisting of epitaphs to love lost, the collection begins with an invitation to “Engage Me.” In “The Play” the poet writes her lover and herself into a drama, asking wistfully, “How does it end, this play?” In a litany of complaints about lovers who have done her wrong, Scarlett’s bitterness seethes: “You were the vulture, I the carcass”; “You had me by the soul, or by the wrists.” “To Touch To Taste” and “Skin” show that love sometimes deepens, but more likely, […]

A Lover in the Land of Hell by Jennie Haiman begins on an appropriate upbeat note – “Welcome, Newborn” – and continues with an exploration of high-minded themes.

Haiman feels different from those around her, and speaks in these poems for the downtrodden: “Perhaps I’m here for a reason–maybe the world needs more like me.” She makes poignant cries for help for fellow beings, including animals, plants, and even the planet itself. She urges us to improve our thinking and “just give.” Two poignant works chronicle the life of a street cat and an old dog consigned to a shelter. […]