The Rabid Readers Review Little Book of Verse which is a collection of both humorous and sincerely heartfelt poems from award-winning author Claire Buss.
Seventeen poems giving us a window into the life of a young mother. There is emotion here, pathos, humour and joy. Claire isn’t sugar coating her life, instead she allows us in to see and feel her struggles and her triumphs.
I might have thought the quality of the verse was occasionally a little uneven, but I was pulled in enough for that to not matter.
Favourites?
Six weeks old
And
My Feet Hurt
Four stars and a definite recommendation.
Soul-Songs both Profound and Mundane
It is the most phenomenally hard task to review a collection of poems.
Poetry is not prose which has a simple and clear purpose, it is the soul-song of the author, coming forth as delicate or sturdy ink-blossoms upon each page. So to judge a poem, say ‘here this one is good’ or ‘there this one is not good’ is like trailing your hands through the mist and scooping what you hold into a jar. Pretty much impossible. One can only let it roll through the mind and impact as it will.
Each poem with each mind a unique interaction.
This collection is that of someone whose life is, like all our own, filled with love and worry, burdens and joys and each poem is a profoundly personal response to that – but made universal through the medium of print.
I enjoyed far more than I found left me unmoved and only a few were so far from my own expectations that they resonated not at all.
You should read these, find your own moments in them, see which touch you and speak to the greater truth as only poetry can, giving meaning to the mundane or exploring powerful truths.
If you do, I am sure you will find poems there which speak to you as powerfully as ‘Late Night Delivery’ and ‘Haiku’, amongst others, spoke to me.
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