Finding Passage
poems by Molly Weller
Published by Poetic Matrix Books
133 pages, price $16.00 (shipping included)
ISBN: 978-0-9789597-5-3
Description
The Book
"These earthy poems achieve a captivating synthesis of texture, emotion, and natural
imagery. We can taste and smell the tears that "catch on the whipping strands" of
hair, the "moon~pale petals" of fear embracing a night of silent heartbreak. Exultation
and despair reveal themselves in the stench of rotting leaves, the feathered wings
of snowflakes, the relentless pull of sun and tide — wrapping us up in the
ache and wonder of being."
— Stephen R. Jones, author of The Last Prairie, A Sandhills
Journal and Peterson Field Guide to the North American Prairie.
Publisher's Comments
Molly Weller gives us these moments, almost in passing, that we can go on with on our own, they don't stop at the end of the poem but continue on in our reading. It's like we are walking down a path and each poem tells of a moment on that path. Sometimes, as in "Turtle," she give us a startling image – "mountains its way to the sea." And at the end of "Hysteria," "curling in on itself/like a page/on fire." Very nice. In "Mood Swings" we continue with her "…pulling laundry from the lines." At the end of the poem there are no ending.
In "Set Against," in the last stanza, "but still a bowl of cereal" is just a perfect common moment that makes the piece something we are so involved with.
From Finding Passage:
| Turtle |
Set Against (last stanza) |
|---|---|
|
A round shell, pale banded pink long empty of life, snaps in two. The one who gave it a ragged edge, angled now the sun on both shoulders dawn breaking across bare back, shadow falling gray across an amethyst beach, mountains its way to the sea. |
New place new home, but still a bowl of cereal as a common rain washes away the smog and mattes the dust on a traveler settling in. |