cheryl6of8's review
4.0
Normally I am one who savors collections of poetry, sipping from them over and over until I have absorbed them entirely. This one, however, I gulped down like refreshing water after a long thirst. It called to all the various fragments of female experience within me. It contains the echo of terror of miscarriage, the uncertainty of the new bride looking back on the life that is no more, the memory of childhood with new understanding for the sorrows and miseries one's mother experienced, the internal battle between being a part of the "us" and maintaining the "I", the cultural expectations of womanhood and motherhood and personhood. The metaphors and the phrasing are sharp and strong, "These words anchor themselves just / long enough for me to write them here." captures the fleeting nature of inspiration and memory and epiphany; "How am I like the mist? I am more tangible tha air, yet / I might evaporate in the warm arms of a lover." embodies the sensuality of summer; "Children are my mortal coil. / But they know arms are not enough to contain their mother." is, for me, the ultimate truth of being a woman in today's world -- the longing and the expectation, the need for balance between the good of being oneself and the good and being for others.
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