A well-written but occasionally verbose collection that will please academics but may test the patience of lay readers.
An academic poetry opus from prolific Cuban author Yáñez (The Bleeding Wound/Sangra Por La Herida, 2014, etc.).
Divided into four sections, the author’s latest collection opens with “Acto I: The Visits/Las Visitas,” which takes readers through settings shrouded in secrecy: “Don’t be deceived by appearances: / the patios of the convents / —those flower-filled, disquieting jails— / may lend themselves to dirty tricks of the worst kind.” In “Intervalo: A Reminder/Recordatorio,” the speaker tells readers that “poets dream / of a long permanence / and to that end they construct cathedrals / and poems.” “Acto II: Class Notes/Apuntes de clase” reads like a clever advice column for students; “Rhetorically Speaking” offers tips on hiding what one is reading or writing from a professor, and in “A Generational Duty,” the author encourages young poets to “do whatever you must to sew within the secret seam / of letters / the shifting pain of the universe / and the laws of the tenderness that is always flowing / always flowing.” This section also invokes legendary poets such as Jorge Luis Borges and Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz in eponymous poems. “Final: Limitations/Limitaciones” is rife with death references and ends with a contemplative poem about a phone book with the contact information of the departed. While the author excels at anchoring the reader in physical surroundings, and Miller has faithfully translated the Spanish text, perhaps what Yáñez needed more than a translator was a stronger editor. The poet’s descriptions can be flowery, such as this one of a hotel: “Its demolition, / planned by the competent officialdom, / will preclude new accomplices / to its antiquity / (I wonder to whom it will now relate / its stories /and its delusions of grandeur).” Overall, the book feels like a memoir written in stanzas, at times bordering on self-indulgence and the kind of nostalgia better shared between two friends: “don’t fail to keep in mind / that those places / we never visited / will still be weighing heavily on me.”
A well-written but occasionally verbose collection that will please academics but may test the patience of lay readers.Pub Date: March 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-944176-11-2
Page Count: 135
Publisher: Cubanabooks
Review Posted Online: Feb. 27, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An emotional, captivating Christian story in verse.
Heidish (A Misplaced Woman, 2016, etc.) presents an account of St. Francis of Assisi’s life, as told from his father’s perspective in poetic form.
St. Francis is known as a saint who believed in living the Gospel, gave sermons to birds, and tamed a wolf. Over the course of 84 poems, Heidish tells her own fictionalized version of the saint’s journey. In his youth, Francesco is an apprentice of his father, Pietro Bernardone, a fabric importer. The boy is a sensitive dreamer and nature lover who sees “natural holiness in every living thing.” As an adult, Francesco decides to pursue knighthood, but God warns him to “Go back, child / Serve the master.” He joins the Church of San Damiano, steals his father’s storeroom stock, and sells it to rebuild the church. His furious father chains him in the cellar, and the bishop orders Francesco to repay the debt. Afterward, father and son stop speaking to each other; Francesco becomes a healer of the sick and a proficient preacher. After failing to broker a peace agreement during wartime, Francesco falls into depression and resigns his church position. He retreats to the mountains and eventually dies; it’s only then that Pietro becomes a true follower of St. Francis: “You are the father now and I the son / learning still what it means to be a saint,” he says. Heidish’s decision to tell this story from Pietro’s perspective is what makes this oft-told legend seem fresh again. She uses superb similes and metaphors; for example, at different points, she writes that St. Francis had eyes like “lit wicks” and a spirit that “shone like a clean copper pot.” In another instance, she describes the Church of San Damiano as a place in which “walls crumbled / like stale dry bread.” Following the poems, the author also offers a thorough and engaging historical summary of the real life of St. Francis, which only adds further context and depth to the tale.
An emotional, captivating Christian story in verse.Pub Date: Feb. 23, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-9905262-1-6
Page Count: 146
Publisher: Dolan & Associates
Review Posted Online: April 19, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A poignant collection by a talented poet still in search of one defining voice.
A debut volume of poetry explores love and war.
Divided into four sections, Osaki’s book covers vast emotional territories. Section 1, entitled “Walking Back the Cat,” is a reflection on youthful relationships both familial and romantic. “Dying Arts,” the second part, is an examination of war and its brutal consequences. But sections three and four, named “Tradecraft” and “Best Evidence” respectively, do not appear to group poems by theme. The collection opens with “My Father Holding Squash,” one of Osaki’s strongest poems. It introduces the poet’s preoccupation with ephemera—particularly old photographs and letters. Here he describes a photo that is “several years old” of his father in his garden. Osaki muses that an invisible caption reads: “Look at this, you poetry-writing / jackass. Not everything I raise is useless!” The squash is described as “bearable fruit,” wryly hinting that the poet son is considered somewhat less bearable in his father’s eyes. Again, in the poem “Photograph,” Osaki is at his best, sensuously describing a shot of a young woman and the fleeting nature of that moment spent with her: “I know only that I was with her / in a room years ago, and that the sun filtering / into that room faded instantly upon striking the floor.” Wistful nostalgia gives way to violence in “Dying Arts.” Poems such as “Preserve” present a battleground dystopia: “Upturned graves and craters / to swim in when it rains. / Small children shake skulls / like rattles, while older ones carve rifles / out of bone.” Meanwhile, “Silver Star” considers the act of escorting the coffin of a dead soldier home, and “Gun Song” ruminates on owning a weapon to protect against home invasion. The language is more jagged here but powerfully unsettling nonetheless. The collection boasts a range of promising poetic voices, but they do not speak to one another, a common pitfall found in debuts. “Walking Back the Cat” is outstanding in its refined attention to detail; the sections following it read as though they have been produced by two or more other poets. Nevertheless, this is thoughtful, timely writing that demands further attention.
A poignant collection by a talented poet still in search of one defining voice.Pub Date: Jan. 31, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-984198-32-7
Page Count: 66
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: June 26, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
