How It Looks Away from Here
by Joan Fiset

Description

A second book of poetry from Joan Fiset with Ravenna, pairing with, resonating with, photography by Sabrina Roberts.  A lot is laid bare in these pages: the damage, scars and surprises in words and black & white images–expressions of precision, blur and slant, all woven into what forms memory and narration.  A book to savor and return to.  “The images next to the poems are so resonant.  That chipped doll’s face!” (Bhanu Kapil)  Time seeps and buckles and makes a new shape in these pages.

Except:

ACROSS

I am going to walk to the corner

sit on the curb

turn around and slowly walk back

you will say nothing

I have a green pocket

trees on both sides of the street

if you ask me a question

if you never ask

I will carry the answer

in cupped hands to the river

where the boat will come

across blue water

 

Comments:

“…This arresting collaboration of poems and photographs embodies the ineffable.  Its impact reverberates long after reading.” (Sarah Townsend, author of Setting the Wire: a Memoir of Postpartum Psychosis)

“…Infinite cosmos squeezed into infinitesimal moments within and without….” (Michael Eigen, author of The Challenge of Being Human, Under the Totem in Search of a Path, the Sensitive Self)

“This is undoubtedly an ambitious collection insomuch as it invites us to construct their own story around the sparse information proffered; to take the inferences, the clues, a nod of acknowledgement here, a spark of memory there, to throw some light on their own particular direction of travel. The poetry is thoughtful, emotionally intelligent and weighted with a keen sensibility; like inklings of illumination, fireflies along the way.

“The photographs which accompany the words are particularly impressive in that they add a further layer of ambiguity, but also a suggestion of meaning to these sometimes obscure, but always fascinating poems: a tilting, stained lampshade; scraps of material on a wire fence; an isolated fan on bare floorboards; a wrecked sun-lounger … they all signal a mood, a state of mind that, however obliquely, guides us to a little more understanding and, furthermore, are hauntingly beautiful in themselves. This combination of off-key photography and short form, equivocal poetry makes for a most absorbing read” (Robert Dunsdon. See the full review on Heavy Feather Review )