Category: Reviews

Sundress Reads: Review of Sailing Paper Boats & Other Stories

Sundress Reads header in black and white. A sheep wearing glasses is sitting on a stool on the left-hand side. It holds a hot cup of a drink in the left hand and a book in the right.
A cover of a book, showing a photo of a bright red paper boat sailing in blackish floodwaters in the center, with pelting rain and blue lightning strikes coming from the gray sky above. In the background are blurry outlines of green trees. overlaid yellow circles near the top. The title, "Sailing Paper Boats & Other Stories," is written in white on the lower half of the cover. The author's name, Swetha Amit, is written beneath.

Swetha Amit’s short story collection, Sailing Paper Boats & Other Stories (Alien Buddha Press, 2025), is an earnest, poignant collage of stories that explore both the fragility and resilience of human relationships and the natural world in the wake of disaster. Over the course of nine short stories, Amit beautifully captures the fear, loss, longing, and cautious hope one navigates as their notions of home, family, and belonging begin to transform.

Amit grounds readers in the environment of each story through her unvarnished, simple prose and deeply honest tone. Like reading through an old personal diary that you stumbled upon at the thrift store, or a sociologist’s field notes chronicling the lives of the humans they observe, Amit presents the characters as everyday people with their own memories, perspectives, and responses to the changes unfolding around them.

Using a first-person stream-of-consciousness narration, she lays bare the unpleasant and, sometimes, precarious realities of life that happen without warning. She explores issues such as climate-induced displacement, the material and emotional toll of natural disasters on local communities, and the illness and loss of loved ones.

This is brilliantly portrayed in the one-paragraph story, “The Nest”, where the speaker contends with the trauma of losing their house in a forest fire. When the speaker comes across a quail’s nest teeming with new life, they recall: “As the sky turns orange, I feel a pulsating rush of fear in my veins. I look at the tiny home of twigs in front of me. It reminds me of my old home wiped out by the fumes of orange and hues of smoke” (35). For the speaker, even the orange setting sun triggers their memories of the fire and of a home that no longer exists. The shocking abruptness of the flashback, heightened by the contrast between a fragile bird’s nest and a home burned to ashes, illustrates how severely the speaker has been affected by the catastrophe. Amit’s intimate portrayal invites readers to engage with these experiences.

Weather and natural disasters are a constant motif throughout the collection. As I read, I was fascinated by how the climate-related imagery in the stories seemed to reflect the internal landscapes of the characters as they face upheavals in their lives and relationships. See how, in “The Floor Beneath My Feet”, the speaker and her husband grapple with marital tension and infidelity between them when an earthquake hits their home: “The wooden floor beneath us is threatening to crumble at any moment… Our wedding photo, taken four years ago, lies on the floor, surrounded by shards of glass” (16).

Similarly, in “The Wrecked Wharf”, the storm surge crashing through the Capitola Beach wharf mirrors the speaker’s mental state after the sudden passing of his fiancée: “A few days later, a wall of water split the wharf in two….Around that time, you received news about your stage four lung cancer diagnosis. The devastating news shattered my heart and mind” (40). By drawing parallels between the destructive force of natural disasters and the characters’ mental states, Amit emphasizes the emotional weight of coping with relationships that have been permanently altered, allowing the reader to better understand the uncertainty, inner displacement, and other complex feelings that arise during the mourning process. This helps immerse the reader in the narrative, making its most heart-wrenching moments linger beyond the page.

At its core, however, Sailing Paper Boats is a short story collection centered around the theme of resilience. This is most clearly seen in “Sailing Paper Boats”, where the child protagonist, Krishna, and his family are suddenly uprooted from their seaside village due to flooding. As the rising waters submerge his home, instead of falling into despair, he turns to his faith, reminding himself that “Ma always emphasized how true faith in the almighty keeps us afloat” (13). In several stories across the collection, Amit explores how faith and spirituality are powerful resources for overcoming obstacles. Prayer becomes a way for Krishna to maintain his agency and hope, even when confronted with situations beyond his control. Later on, when Krishna’s village is forced to evacuate, he notices that the flimsy paper boat he made is still holding its ground against the flood:

“I took a deep breath. Maybe we’d soon see Pa…. He might find a better job…. The government may give us better homes. Ma and Pa may stop their quarrels. Like the boat, we could also sail smoothly on these rough waters. The storm will eventually subside with time, and sunny days will smile upon us again…” (15)

To Krishna, the miraculously intact paper boat is a symbol of survival. Through these comforting lines and visual imagery of the warm, gentle sun returning in the end, Amit reminds us how we, too, have the strength to recover from catastrophes and drastic life changes.

In Sailing Paper Boats & Other Stories, Amit skillfully turns personal memories of natural disasters into narratives that connect with all readers. I could understand the characters’ unspoken fears and frustrations and see myself in the struggles they encountered, from avoidant arguments with parents, like in “Sands of Time”, to the longing for a time before, when a loved one was still alive, or when life felt more stable, when you were stronger. But much like how nature is resilient, humans are incredibly resilient as well. Reading this collection taught me a valuable lesson: “Paper boats may be fragile, but they sail on”.

A South Asian woman smiling and sitting on a green couch. She has black hair, half lying over her right shoulder and half down her back, and is wearing a wine-red turtleneck. Behind her are two closed window curtains, one light blue and floral print, and the other solid teal.

Tara Rahman (she/her) is a Sundress editorial intern with a BA in English Language and Literature from Smith College and an MSc in Global Development from SOAS, University of London. She is also a recent graduate of the Columbia Publishing Course in Oxford, UK. With a strong interest in culture, identity, and global history, her personal writing often focuses on intersectionality and the untold stories and experiences of marginalized communities.

Sundress Reads: Review of Toothache in the Bone

Sundress Reads
A cover of a book, showing a hand-drawn illustration of the left half of a hip bone in the center. The background is beige like parchment paper, and the skeleton is drawn with pencil shading. There is a rectangular border around the hip bone drawing. The title, "Toothache in the Bone," is written in red in the bottom-right corner. The author's name, Colleen S. Harris, is written beneath.

Toothache in the Bone (boats against the current, 2025) by Colleen S. Harris is a raw exploration of death, grief, trauma, and resilience. This poetry collection examines the body and its limitations under strain: diagnoses of bone damage and infertility; the death of loved ones; a marriage; and constant hospital visits and struggles with body image. Harris’s poems reflect on the human condition and the complexities of life with chronic illness, revealing physical and emotional scars with vulnerability that leaves an ache in the soul.

Throughout the collection, medical imagery is a recurring motif. Harris uses these vivid depictions to convey the physical experience of illness and show how it affects everyday life and one’s sense of self. Each poem is infused with visual references to needle jabs, broken bones, and allusions to medical terminology, such as macrophages and CRP (C-reactive protein) test numbers. These depictions of physical suffering linger with the reader, showing the deep influence of chronic illness on the speaker’s perception of everyday life.

In “Primum Non Nocere (First, Do No Harm)”, Harris writes: “First you must be patient, a patient / patient, who understands three months / of waiting for the chance to supplicate / to the physician could be worse… // When the day / comes, remember not to use the upper numbers of the pain scale, no nurse / believes anything above an eight” (23). These lines illustrate the speaker’s frustration with a healthcare system that does not adequately serve its patients. The endless cycle of waiting for appointments, enduring blood tests, and interacting with doctors who dismiss her symptoms renders the speaker drained. Her lack of agency in her medical treatment and constant pain creates a sense of helplessness towards her body: “Pain is a marriage, / a commitment, ‘til death do us part” (33). The speaker ultimately accepts that this senseless suffering will always be part of her life. Through this candid depiction of the intense psychological toll of illness, Harris guides us to understand the feeling of being trapped in a body that constantly betrays you. 

A central theme of Toothache in the Bone is coping with loss, grief, and the myriad complex emotions they evoke. Harris engages with loss in its many forms: the loss of health, the loss of reproductive possibility, and the loss of people. In “Rituals of Grief,” Harris grapples with reproductive loss through parallels with the mourning behaviors of elephants and crows. She writes, “Animals know the importance / of company, how a critical mass / of community can sustain grief // at a bearable level” (26). Later, she recounts the experience of losing a pregnancy, writing: “No animal, alone, I am buried / within these walls… // no crowd to wing with me, to step / in solidarity toward your body… // to prove that… I remain beyond your remains (27).

In contrast to the sense of community and shared grief found within elephant and crow groups, Harris highlights the alienation and loneliness that surround sudden loss among humans, particularly the experience of miscarriage. The societal stigma around miscarriage often forces women to grieve their miscarriage privately, internalizing their loss as a personal failure: What is wrong with my body? Why isn’t it working as it should? Without any community support to help her carry the weight of this pain, the speaker falls into a deep depression. Speaking openly about this issue is crucial to normalizing discussion around miscarriage and building community among women and individuals facing similar challenges. 

The thing I find most compelling about this collection is its unapologetic discussion of death and the nuances of the grieving process. Harris artfully describes the range of emotions that arise when navigating loss. In “On Letting Go of the Dying,” the speaker mourns both the death of her dog and her dying marriage. On witnessing the last moments of a beloved pet, Harris writes: “My mother / made me see his ribs pushing their way rudely through / his skin / I was not brave / when I carried him for the last / time… // Five / years passed before I could reach into the too small box to spoon // his ashes into a pendant…” (23). Through the use of visceral imagery, Harris illustrates the speaker’s confrontation with death, its brutality on the body, and its permanence. Death is often perceived as a biological, inevitable reality of life. Harris voices the fear and heartbreak of witnessing a loved one’s final days. It is a type of sorrow that never truly leaves you.

The latter half of the poem shifts in tone as Harris redirects the reader’s attention to the unhappy marriage. Harris describes it as a “skeletal, / gasping thing,” writing, “I needed // no memento, did not want to drown in the ashes. I wore my / good red dancing shoes instead” (24). Like shedding layers of old skin, the speaker is relieved to cast off her dying marriage and start life anew. Harris uses this juxtaposition to emphasize that accepting loss is not always negative; at times, it is a necessary process for growth and survival.

I have never read a poetry collection as devastating as Toothache in the Bone. I found myself moved by its honest discussions of illness, death, and body image, particularly in “Primum Non Nocere,” “Nel Mezzo Del Cammin di Nostra Vita,” and “I Dreamt I Was Unblemished.” Harris’s unflinching account of coming to terms with illness and loss reverberated deep in my bones, staying with me long after I finished reading. Her ability to articulate difficult human emotions, such as self-hate and sorrow, allows the collection to resonate with readers both with and without chronic conditions. In this collection, Colleen S. Harris masterfully gives voice to the hidden pain that our bodies hold.

A South Asian woman smiling and sitting on a green couch. She has black hair, half lying over her right shoulder and half down her back, and is wearing a wine-red turtleneck. Behind her are two closed window curtains, one light blue and floral print, and the other solid teal.

Tara Rahman (she/her) is a Sundress editorial intern with a BA in English Language and Literature from Smith College and an MSc in Global Development from SOAS, University of London. She is also a recent graduate of the Columbia Publishing Course in Oxford, UK. With a strong interest in culture, identity, and global history, her personal writing often focuses on intersectionality and the untold stories and experiences of marginalized communities.

Sundress Reads: Review of ‘Flood’ by Rachel Bulman

In Flood (Sunlight Press 2025), Christine Kalafus writes with power. The myriad themes and stories she interweaves are beautiful, but more importantly, they serve a greater purpose: a woman writing with intention.

Dealing with her lived experience as source material, Kalafus layers snippets of her life in a vast collage of motherhood, chemotherapy, mental health, and what it means to be a woman.

Wielding fluid, gentle prose and a calm, matter-of-fact tone that occasionally dips into self-deprecating, Kalafus draws the reader into a conversation which, to me, felt like reconnecting with an older sister years after losing touch. She recollects her past with authority and insight, but lays bare the doubt, the pain and the ultimate growth that brought her through the ‘flood’, a metaphor used throughout the book to illustrate drowning, both in a literal and emotional sense. It is a highly reflective, carefully arranged memoir, unfolding the cost of pushing your body and mind to their limits.

I am reluctant to reveal too much of the content, but Kalafus’ situation is a tragedy that hardly bears imagining––lurking cancer, three children: one only four years old, two yet unborn.

As Kalafus so plainly puts it: “You can’t outrun a flood” (110).

Indeed, water pervades every aspect of the book. Humidity in the house, ruining the piano; the fresh spring at neighbours’; the leaking cracks in the basement; every literal breakage offers a mirror to Kalafus’ internal landscape.

Prevalent throughout the story as a stronghold against storms, the house earns its place at the centre of LJ Mucci’s cover design. When introduced, it feels alive, offering sanctuary, becoming a manifestation of feeling outcast or odd. It brings joy to Kalafus, “as if the house’s blueprint had been daylight” (21).

But this creation solidified my fears as Kalafus steadily accelerates the looming threat of a flood. Not just of emotion, but a physical, biblical flood that may leave behind nothing but wreckage. And all emphasised by the unearthing feeling of being told something you thought was certain is not: my husband loves me, my house cannot flood, I do not have cancer. Flood is what happens when solid ground becomes malleable, and stability falls away.

Over the course of the memoir, Kalafus delves into her life before diagnosis. She recalls growing up in Connecticut and northern Virginia, discusses the internalized threats women face and observes society persistently teaching women how to dress to avoid danger, and so the real threats go unnoticed––invasion “from the inside” (3). Amid powerful childhood memories, Kalafus recalls being objectified, sexualised, and fearful, shared with the casual understanding that this is what ‘normal’ looks like for most women. As I read, I found myself struck by an outsider’s perspective: the tragedy of growing up as a woman and never learning how proud you should be.

Kalafus’ musings on womanhood permeate the whole text: “In my family, a woman’s denial of herself equalled survival” (23), “I apologise for the mother they won in the lottery” (114), “I ignore him because that’s how I’ve been socially trained to manage a raging asshole” (121). To my surprise, I felt known by this book, and I felt rage on behalf of Kalafus, and every woman whose opinion was superseded by a man who thought he knew best.

With razor-sharp precision, Flood elaborates on female guilt, the pernicious companion to feminine rage: harder to eradicate and all too easy to indulge. Even after all she has survived, Kalafus struggles not to blame herself (163).

This was a topic made all the more raw by the realities of medical treatment. A combination of the occasional colossal ineptitude of medical professionals and the consistent devaluation of women’s opinions, Flood suggests that negligence can become a form of cruelty without intent. Kalafus makes a devastating case against the apathy of doctors and the American healthcare system at large.

I took away from this book a lesson in setting limits––a hard-won battle for Kalafus––an example of expressed agency, a deeper understanding of its worth, and a steadfast belief that your opinions about your body have value.

Kalafus delicately puts something that should be taught to every woman from childhood: you do not have to keep the whole world in balance, as much as you are told to. It is an impossible task; Atlas holding up the sky; Sisyphus’s boulder: “As a modern woman, I’m supposed to do everything at one time. Glass ceiling smacker, mother martyr, sex goddess, selfless sisterdaughterfriend” (156). All roles that led to such acute stress that they were considered the only suggested cause of her diagnosis.

Merging the poetic intent of Mary Oliver with the clarity of Margaret Atwood, Kalafus’s writing is ruthless with details and surgically precise. From the smooth and elegant inclusion of a second-person perspective to the balanced and intriguing variations in page layout, including lists and quotes, Kalafus offers an arrangement finely tuned for brutal contextual impact.

Flood layers its tragic elements so delicately that I felt the water rising around me––despite the stress of two newborns, rising water tables, and chemotherapy, I had been mercifully spared worrying about the details of medical bills and insurance repayments until Kalafus chose to open that floodgate as well.

Just as Kalafus quotes her mother’s wisdom, I will repeat it here: “It is possible to be completely terrified of something and do it anyway” (198) to show that you can survive the flood and smile again on the other side.

Order your copy of Flood today!

The side profile of a pale-skinned woman wearing glasses and a grey baseball cap as she looks off to her right side. In the background is a scenic body of water, greenery on the horizon line, and a clear blue sky.

Rachel Bulman (she/her) holds a BA in English and Creative Writing as well as an MA in Publishing from the University of Exeter, specialising in interactive and children’s fiction. Her written work has appeared in The Book of Choices, Velvet Fields, and Exeposé, among others. Find her on Instagram @worm.can.read, through her online portfolio, or ask the bridge troll who taught him his riddles three.

Sundress Reads: Review of My Arabic Breakfast

A cover of a book, showing the top half of a silver, circular, engraved platter with various Levantine foods such as mint tea, zaatar, and olives arranged in a circle. A plate of sunny-side-up eggs sit in the middle. The title, "My Arabic Breakfast," is written in Arabic and English letters against a bright yellow background. The author and illustrators' names, Yasmeen Fakhereddin and Noor Naqaweh is written beneath in white Arabic letters.

Written by Palestinian-Canadian educator, Yasmeen Fakhereddin, and illustrated by Syrian-Palestinian artist, Noor Naqaweh, My Arabic Breakfast (Zingo Ringo, 2024) is a bilingual board book that introduces young learners to Arabic. With vibrant illustrations of Levantine breakfast foods, and accompanied by English translations and pronunciation guides, this book helps children build their vocabulary, pattern recognition, and numeracy skills, all while spotlighting Palestinian culture.

Naqaweh’s hand-drawn illustrations make My Arabic Breakfast a visual feast for the eyes. From the first page, readers are welcomed to the dining table teeming with flavorful Levantine dishes. Each food item is drawn in mouthwatering detail—sesame seed-coated falafel, labneh cheese balls doused in olive oil, and mini filled flatbreads with steam wafting off them. The liveliness of the dining room and the warm, bright colors throughout the book remind readers of home, the feeling that they have a seat at the table. Another highlight of My Arabic Breakfast is phonetic Arabic spellings and English translations, which make bilingual learning easy. Many immigrant and interracial families hope that their children stay connected to their cultural heritage. Fakhereddin, as a Palestinian-Canadian and parent herself, understands this, and so aims to build children’s confidence in Arabic while introducing bits of Levantine culture in a way that remains accessible to children.

The first full-page spread inside My Arabic Breakfast. It shows a yellow dining room, three brown dining chairs, and a dining table with a variety of Levantine and Palestinian foods. The left-hand side contains a jar of jam, a plate of cucumber and tomato slices, a bowl of olives, a basket of pita bread, twin bowls of zaatar and olive oil, bowls of fava bean foul, and a platter of falafels. In the center are a plate of mini filled pitas on an Al-Khalili pottery plate, a pan of six sunny-side-up eggs, salt and pepper shakers, an assorted platter of cheese, and a bowl of labneh cheese submerged in olive oil. On the right side of the table is a red tea kettle with steam coming out of the spout, a sugar bowl and plate of mint leaves, five glasses of mint tea, a plate with donut-shaped date-filled cookies, a plate of watermelon slices, and a tissue box with a tatreez embroidered cover. On the wall hangs a painting of a green olive branch laden with black olives. The bottom of the page says "welcome" in English on the left side and "ah-lan wa sah-lan" in Arabic on the right.

What makes My Arabic Breakfast unique is that it is entirely Palestinian-made, from the author and illustrator to the publisher, Zingo Ringo Books. Throughout the book, Fakhereddin and Naqaweh highlight their Palestinian roots through small artistic details. The opening spread, for instance, depicts a platter of watermelon slices on the table and a painting of an olive branch, two enduring symbols that represent the cultural identity of Palestinians and the connection to their land. The plate with the mini flatbreads on page 4, and the bowls of zaatar and olive oil on page 7 feature Palestinian pottery designs from the Al Khalil region, while page 8 showcases a traditional Palestinian date-filled cookie. On the last page, where all the food has been eaten, there remains on the table a tissue box with tatreez (embroidery), a traditional Palestinian craft. The book ends with one final, subtle detail—a painting with the word sahteen (“bon appetit”) in Levantine Arabic. Food, the practices and habits around food, hold personal and cultural significance. It is a means for communities to retain their cultural identity. My Arabic Breakfast is not only a language-learning book, but also a love letter to Palestine: culture and people. Through the recurring motifs of Palestinian foods and traditions, Fakhereddin and Naqaweh convey a message of resilience and pride in their heritage. In this way, My Arabic Breakfast is a message to the children of Palestine and the Palestinian diaspora, encouraging future generations to remember and celebrate their identity.

My Arabic Breakfast stands out because it is a board book primarily geared towards bilingual children from the Arabic-speaking diaspora. The significance of Fakhereddin and Naqaweh’s book lies in the mirror it holds up for children of Palestinian and Levantine origin, reflecting their heritage, cultural practices, and everyday experiences, and affirming their sense of identity and belonging. A persistent issue in mainstream English-language children’s books is the misrepresentation and underrepresentation of people of color, Arabs in particular. Even in recent years, the number of children’s stories written by or about Arabs remains very limited. For this reason, My Arabic Breakfast is a meaningful contribution to children’s literature. They can practice recognizing and naming foods from home and learn basic numbers and words in both Arabic and English. At the same time, the visuals render the learning experience all the more engaging.

A spread of two pages inside My Arabic Breakfast. The left page has a purple background with illustrations of three falafels in the center. The left-hand side has the number 3 at the top and the word "falafel" at the bottom in English. The right-hand side has the corresponding Arabic numerals and words. The right page has The right side is a reddish-pink background with four bowls of fava bean foul in the center. The left-hand side has the number 4 at the top and the word "foul" in English, with the corresponding numeral and word in Arabic on the right side.

My Arabic Breakfast is also a delightful read for non-Arabic speakers, helping them develop cultural awareness and appreciation for diverse communities. The book paints an authentic picture of Levantine culture and cuisine, allowing for an immersive educational experience. Children can discover a wide variety of dishes—zaatar, shai bil nana (mint tea), and fava bean foul, among others—and also learn Arabic words and numerals. As I leafed through the book, I found myself captivated by the vivid artwork and the elegance of Arabic script. With each page, my fingers traced the words, following the English pronunciation closely. Even as an adult reader, My Arabic Breakfast offered me an introduction to the richness of Palestinian and Levantine culture. Reading this book reminded me of the food and cultural practices in my own family as a Bangladeshi-American Muslim, of the joy of visiting friends and sharing traditional foods, and of the deep sense of togetherness. Moreover, reading My Arabic Breakfast made me reflect on the importance of diverse and inclusive books for children. Growing up in a small town in the American South, I was always curious about my heritage and mother tongue. At school, opportunities to explore this curiosity were rare. Thus, the presence of books like My Arabic Breakfast in libraries and bookstores is essential. They encourage children to learn about and cherish their identities. Addressed to young learners, My Arabic Breakfast is all about celebrating and maintaining one’s roots.

A South Asian woman smiling and sitting on a green couch. She has black hair, half lying over her right shoulder and half down her back, and is wearing a wine-red turtleneck. Behind her are two closed window curtains, one light blue and floral print, and the other solid teal.

Tara Rahman (she/her) is a Sundress editorial intern with a BA in English Language and Literature from Smith College and an MSc in Global Development from SOAS, University of London. She is also a recent graduate of the Columbia Publishing Course in Oxford, UK. With a strong interest in culture, identity, and global history, her personal writing often focuses on intersectionality and the untold stories and experiences of marginalized communities. In her free time, she enjoys reading literary and YA fiction, watching anime, and spending time with her tripod cat, Tuntuni.

Sundress Reads: Review of
The Watch: Time to Witness the Beauty of It All

Sundress Reads logo, which shows a sheep reading, with glasses on and a book. Logo is black and white.
Cover of the book The Watch, showing a clock in clouds

An introspective memoir about loss and life, The Watch: Time to Witness the Beauty of It All (Wildhouse Publications, 2025) by Paula Sager is a healing walk through the process of being present while a loved one passes away. The Watch is part diary and part philosophy, the author using her strong mind-body connection as a teacher of the Alexander Technique to feel her way through what her soul is undergoing. Collecting many quotes from various authors, philosophers, and family members, Paula Sager offers that our emotions can be processed through the Discipline of Authentic Movement, and that it’s possible to stay mentally present even in the most difficult of times. Trigger warning: If you’ve had a loved one pass away or expect someone to pass soon, this can be a healing, but also at times difficult read. Please give yourself time and private space to process thoughts and emotions while paddling through this book.

While reading The Watch, I felt like I traveled back in time to when my grandparents were completing their life cycles, only this time, I felt more present in my memories. If you’ve had a loved one die slowly of cancer or other medical issues, this book will deeply resonate with you. Sager’s writing captures daily life, the little and big tasks that continue to need doing, while also showing how she stays present and tries to enjoy every moment she can before there are no more moments. One quote from Sager’s father, Bob, continues to float in my mind:

  “These are the waves of yesterday’s wind.” (Sager 53)

This small sentence encapsulates what it feels like after realizing that someone you’re close to has little time left. You’re propelled forward by the waves from yesterday’s wind that blew your life onto a new path that will soon depart from the path of your loved one. Dwelling on the circle of life and her family members that are still in the beginning or middle of the life cycle helps Sager through the process. She writes of her brothers and her children, as well as how their pasts and futures seem to mirror not only her own, but her passing father’s. The watch, which began mysteriously falling apart after Sager’s father died, appears recurrently as a reminder of time, both precious and fleeting. When Sager trades watches with her father, it’s as if she’s giving him the best gift she can: more time with her and love.

Despite life’s limitations, a sense of calmness and acceptance imbues the book. The way Sager bares her raw emotions for the reader and conveys a calmness is rather wonderous. Some of her conversations with her father are true gems. For example, Sager’s father Bob says at one point, still a bit hazy from anesthesia:

  “I want to tell you about something I dreamed … First there was the dream of death
   … And it was fine! … And then there was the dream of birth—and it was spectacular!
   … They really have it figured out. It all makes sense, and there is nothing to worry
   about.” (Sager 65)

It’s hard to accept death, even though we know it’s coming. The most amazing takeaway for me personally from The Watch is a new sense that I might finally be able to let go of fear of the unknown. Somehow, through reading about Sager’s life, her peaceful moments, her father’s insights, she has talked me free of fear of the unknown. One of her and her family’s extraordinary abilities seems to be to take life in stride. Although there are certainly tough time periods, overall, Sager enjoys the last moments with her father and calmly accepts her experiences, letting fear depart as well.

Kayaking Watercolor by Everly Arts, showing a kayaker paddling on the water towards a sunset between two mountains
Kayaking Watercolor by Everly Arts

Sager’s father loved to kayak, and the family ultimately return him to the water he loved in a unique kayak flotilla funeral. This poem Sager quotes is quite fitting:

“Wave of sorrow,
Do not drown me now:
I see the island
Still ahead somehow.

I see the island
And its sands are fair:
Wave of sorrow,
Take me there.”
(Sager 51, quoting “Island” by Langston Hughes)

Sager takes readers there, showing us the beauty of our lives that remain after loss and the love of memories we will have forever. She also touches on some intriguing supernatural experiences she has had surrounding her father and his passing period, such as feeling pain at the same time as him, a swan flying up to the family that seems to embody some presence of her father’s, the watch falling apart after he died, and unusual mind-body connections she experiences through Janet Adler’s Discipline of Authentic Movement.

I recommend this book for readers that are of the “middle generation,” that have both children as well as parents in their lives. I would also like to recommend the following tea pairing with this book: Tulsi & Ginger Tea from Traditional Medicinals. This tea provides calming stress relief and warming ginger to heal your body and soul.

The Watch: Time to Witness the Beauty of It All is available from Wildhouse Publications

Ana Mourant sitting on grass reading a book. She has light skin and blonde hair, has a sunflower in her hair, and is wearing a green sundress.

Ana Mourant (she/her) is an editorial intern for Sundress Publications and a recent graduate of the University of Washington’s editing program. She holds a Certificate in Editing as well as a Certificate in Storytelling and Content Strategy, and a BA in English Language and Literature, with a minor in Professional Writing. Ana conducts manuscript evaluations, edits, and proofreads, as well as provides authenticity and sensitivity readings for Indigenous Peoples content. Ana loves nature writing and Indigenous cultures, and, when she’s not working, is often out in the wilderness tracking animals, Nordic skiing, or just enjoying nature.

Sundress Reads: Review of And Yet Held

Sundress Reads black-and-white logo with a sheep sitting on a stool next to the words "Sundress Reads." The sheep is wearing glasses and holding a cup filled with a hot drink in one hoof and holding an open book in the other.
The cover of And Yet Held by T. De Los Reyes. It features a woman whose face is obscured by tiny blue flowers.

In T. De Los Reyes’s latest chapbook, And Yet Held (Bull City Press 2024), each poem feels like the lyrical embodiment of coming home and sinking into a soft mattress. This sensation arises not from an absence of stressors (as internalized body stigma and a fear of humiliation permeate this book), but from the way mundane objects and small acts of devotion are magnified in the speaker’s eyes.

Familiar comforts are found in tender scenes of domesticity and in speculative vignettes, where the supportive presence of a significant other and the invigorating beauty of everyday life encourage the speaker to talk unabashedly about her affection. Here, De Los Reyes refuses to dress love in the thickest of metaphors, preferring to offer it with generosity through personal anecdotes drawn from her life.

Whether the speaker is watching ice cubes melt slowly in her coffee or noticing the satisfied quirk at the corner of her partner’s lips, every observation is steeped in reverence and care. Attentiveness becomes a comfortable language for the speaker to express her admiration and gratitude, as well as signal her anxiety in moments of distress. The maturity required to admit these emotions is linked to the speaker’s feelings about intimacy.

While some of these poems document healing through glimmers of confidence amid self-doubt, they remain cognizant of how the body can carry the weight of its past. In “Gargantuan,” the speaker recalls, “My childhood / was a city where tenderness was frowned upon” (De Los Reyes 35), giving us a glimpse into the shame that stained her youth. This pervasive sense of unease only fades as her present comes into view. A calm arrives because, unlike before, she no longer feels alone: for “you are now / holding my body” (De Los Reyes 35). Seemingly minute, an embrace has enormous impact, making its recurrence in the book a constant source of joy. Readers will delight in witnessing the speaker grow flustered and make excuses so that “you can be / the big spoon when I just really [need] / to be held” (De Los Reyes 2), a confession that lays bare our desire for proximity, physical contact, and most of all, safety.

This tight-knit chapbook also sheds light on the ways we cradle each other beyond tactile means. One can “feel held” upon receiving a lover’s gentle gaze from across a room (De Los Reyes 1). Or, one can invite a partner to “hold fast” as they “roam in each other’s memory” (De Los Reyes 4). Through knowing glances and expressions of trust, De Los Reyes wields the word with renewed lucidity, reminding us of the opportunity to grant others the refuge that we ourselves seek. The task of making the world less daunting, she seems to say, is in our hands.

De Los Reyes is urgently aware that the time we have with the people we hold dear is fleeting, but she impressively never rallies against it; instead, the transience of life motivates her to slow down and savor each moment. This attitude is evident in her use of repetition, anaphora, and lists. In “Hard Heart”, De Los Reyes turns her appreciation inward:

“This is for the girl with the hard heart

This is for the girl
who […] tried her best

to play hopscotch with everything
she wanted to avoid

yes this is for the girl who refused to be bamboozled
with the small gestures of this sodden world.” (16–17)

Literary devices here allow past states to persist, insisting on their significance. Sometimes, they stress a powerful longing, while other times (as in the excerpts above), they are used to empower and acknowledge what the speaker has endured.

De Los Reyes also foregrounds the need for autonomy by anchoring many of her poems to a specific “I”—one who is inescapably conscious of her gender, weight, skin color, and Asian features. In a changing room, the speaker recalls, “He asks me for my dress size / and I hesitate” (De Los Reyes 29), and at a party, she remarks, “I’m what some / would call an acquired taste” (De Los Reyes 9). The decision to talk frankly about this “baggage” doesn’t drag the book down, rather it carries it, sharpening the speaker’s frustration and illuminating her relief.

This specificity spoke to me as a Filipino reader, who not only smirked in recognition of some typical Pinoy experiences, but saw myself reflected in the speaker’s gestures of affection, which could be as simple yet resonant as asking a loved one whether they’ve eaten. It got me thinking about my recent experience of moving out and realizing how much stuff I’d accumulated. It just seemed second nature—my habit of keeping everything I loved all clumped together, an impulse that could extend to the chapbook’s preoccupation with (re)collection and safekeeping.

A tour de force in tenderness, And Yet Held is a heartwarming display of devotion, vulnerability, and trust. De Los Reyes’s refreshing and imaginative fascination with the everyday offers solace amid hard times, making this the perfect book to read as you unwind after a long day. The chapbook’s commitment to immersion rather than distance serves as a needful reminder: that while it’s okay to be cautious about the people to whom we assign our care, we could be so much more sustained when we welcome others’ lives to touch and overlap and be held together with our own.

And Yet Held is available from Bull City Press

Aylli, a fair skinned person with short brown hair, sits cross-legged on the grass. He is wearing wide frame glasses paired with a black crew neck top and blue jeans. Small purple flowers and various plants fill the upper half of the background.

Aylli Cortez (he/they) is a transmasc Filipino poet and creative writing graduate of Ateneo de Manila University, where he received a DALISAYAN Award in the Arts for Poetry in 2024. His debut chapbook, Unabandon, is forthcoming from Gacha Press in June 2025. His work has appeared in VERDANT Journal, en*gendered lit, Bullshit Lit, HAD, and like a field, among others. Based in Metro Manila, he is currently a poetry reader for ANMLY and a member of the Ateneo Press Review Crew. Find him online @1159cowboy or visit his website.

Sundress Reads: Review of lithopaedion

Intimate and sorrowful, Carrie Nassif’s lithopaedion (Finishing Line Press, 2023) captures readers in the small, dark womb of motherhood, taking us on the slimy and tender journey to birth and be birthed.

This poetry collection opens with an echoing burst of emotion. The speaker introduces an unnamed subject which they constantly and vaguely refer back to as “you.” The descriptions of this character as a wincing toddler with a “clenched tooth smile and pin curls,” along with other parts including the “tang of [your] injuries,” “paw at them curious,” “flimsy husks,” and “grimy coins,” lead readers to feel protective, almost maternal, over the character (Nassif 1). Only at the end is it revealed that the poem is addressed to the speaker’s own mother. And so it begins: the thirty-four page roller-coaster ride through heartbreak and sweetness. Nassif’s flashes of compassion and endearment sharply contrast whetted moments of conflict to create a stunning collection which seems to reflect on itself as it reflects on motherhood from the perspective of a daughter. 

Each poem is a punch to the gut; so quick in its succession, Nassif’s lithopaedion barely leaves room to recover before grabbing readers roughly by the collar to stand for the next poem. In “the unmothering,” Nassif describes the speaker’s innocent curiosity surrounding their own birth. The speaker of the poem is wise, describing scenes of birth as only a mother would know, such as, “how your beats would wane,” and “feather breath on ours” (Nassif 5). The poem ends with, “then twisted rubber bands so tight around / we fell away unnoticed” (Nassif 5). Nassif begins the next poem by saying, “you who had been so content to rest within my ribs would come convulsing from me on hands and knees” (6). The transition flows so smoothly; if heard aloud, we may wonder when the last poem ends and when the new one begins. Not only is lithopaedion thematically rich and consistent, the speaker’s perspective is, too. Even when the poem is seemingly from a child’s point of view, the speaker’s narrative distance dominates elegantly with the sage reflections and intimacy that only comes with age. 

The collection unabashedly climaxes at several points. The conclusion comes too soon with several poems towards the end finishing their own movements strongly; readers are led into gutting false ends. Each ending leaves readers wondering if what Nassif presents afterwards could possibly top it. “Iterations of collapse” concludes with:

         if even liturgical messengers are tempted to reach

         then who are we not to bleed for the fruit? 

         Eden be damned 

         the orgasm so worth the childbirth (26)

This allusion to the Bible is the first in the collection. The themes of sacrifice and pleasure that Nassif plays with throughout the collection are encapsulated perfectly in these lines, due, in part, to the allusion. Again, Nassif plays with the passage of time, taking us to the conception of the child. Here, the post-birth reflection meditates on the speaker’s personal pleasure, detached from motherhood. The lack of personal pleasure enjoyed by any woman in this collection goes mostly unnoticed until this point, serving as a metaphor for reality. In a few short lines, Nassif has presented us several purposes and interpretations, just one example of many in lithopaedion.

Nassif’s carefully crafted ending leaves us with no doubt that she is a master of diction and a greater master in the art of affliction: “reverberations of afterbirth spiraling within us all” (30). Here, Nassif describes motherhood as it is endured by women who become mothers after first being a daughter. As the speaker in these poems is flawed and suffers greatly, struggling to find space to forgive themself for some far away sin, the speaker also takes on the biggest burden of all: forgiving their own mother. Through motherhood, the speaker seems to find a freshness in empathy. It becomes more difficult to admit that mothers cannot bear everything and easier to understand why their own mother suffered as she did. Nassif’s vulnerability on the page shows us that mothers never stop being daughters and motherhood rips daughterhood away from women, both at the same time. To be a mother is to give and sacrifice. What better way is there to encapsulate this experience than through lithopaedion?

lithopaedion is available for purchase at Finishing Line Press

Hedaya Hasan is a Palestinian writer and designer based in Chicago.

Sundress Reads: Review of Transcendent Gardening

A memorial surrounded by bullets. Swirling white text displays the title "Transcendent Gardening." Displayed at the bottom in white letters: "By Ed Falco."

Ed Falco’s 2022 novel, Transcendent Gardening (C&R Press), is a brilliant work of prose set in Redvale, Georgia in 2016. Though the city and characters are fictional, themes from the story such as violence, loneliness, and the spread of information are incredibly prevalent in today’s reality. The book’s epigraph is by Matthew Zapruder’s poem, “Come On All You Ghosts.” Falco invites readers to see beyond the text through the poem’s final line, “I have to say something important,” which explains the creations of the monsters that follow. 

Violence infests the world of Transcendent Gardening. Falco obliterates the possibility of a story of love, joy, and human connection with the introduction of terror, frustration, and loneliness. This world eats up its characters and spits them into the mud and muck. In many ways, Falco creates monsters, leaving the reader to decide which of his creations is the scariest. The reader witnesses Angel Maso, who is aware he requires help, descend into madness. Through thought and action, Angel demonstrates the violence and chaos of the world, as well as the potentially life-altering consequences of ignoring warning signs. 

This is the story of a lonely man. One who becomes so disconnected from reality, so involved with the dismemberment of his life and psyche, that he becomes separated from all humanity. When Angel drifts far from the ground, his daughter can no longer see him in his eyes (Falco 208). Falco offers a fresh perspective on the intersections between mental health and violence and reminds his readers that tools of violence are superfluous solutions to many of the issues that arise from these intersections. In the end, the reader grieves Angel’s mental health alongside the victims of his actions. 

One continues to become immersed in Falco’s world, keenly aware of the palpable suspense he creates. Falco fosters a familiarity with his characters, an understanding of them as thinking beings, and, at the very apex of the reader’s love for these creations, he drops a bomb. The result: the reader’s world rocks in time with Falco’s plot. Escalation and suspense are as present in this Transcendent Gardening as the characters themselves. One trusts Falco to deliver on the promises he makes early in the book—words and thoughts foreshadow the kinds of violence that result in loss, but no one can prepare for the heart-wrenching catastrophe that is this book’s climax. 

Falco also offers a brilliant depiction of the modes by which history is recorded. Media reports, eyewitness testimonies, and fantastical speculations in Transcendent Gardening often obscure, and in some cases even erase, the truth. For example, the media labels Angel the “Angel of Death” (Falco 184). By glorifying the perpetrator rather than relaying facts and causes, those involved are swept into fantasy, creating stories and motives from thin air. Some even claim to have seen ISIS at the incident and to have heard yelling in Arabic, which the reader knows to be untrue (Falco 185). Such idolization of extreme acts of violence and assignment of terror to a group of unseen individuals leads to the ignorance of historical facts. These stories often excuse the need to look into structural issues that may require attention. In other words, Falco’s novel is a portrait of a leaky house. One may blame water for the destruction of the house and, once a villain is named, see no need to inspect how the water entered. Falco sparks a brilliant discussion on how to prevent future damage by patching cracks in the foundation. 

Transcendent Gardening isn’t all doomsday-level crime and terror. Falco is skilled in depicting deep human connection. His characters fall in love; they make impossible decisions; they become elated and embarrassed and empathize with one another. Angel uses gardening to ground himself to the Earth. Doll squashes her morals for her career. Claire forgives her father for heinous acts of violence. Falco handles potent feelings such as grief, hatred, fear, and loneliness with grace. He paints a best-case scenario in a world where violence is a given, and he gently offers a refreshing perspective on reoccurring problems. That said, this book is potentially triggering to many, especially those who have been affected by gun violence. Falco wants his readers to sit in these uncomfortable feelings. A call to action lurks beneath one of the novel’s concluding lines: “Nothing…was ever going to put an end to the violence in men’s hearts, but you could at least limit their access to the weapons that encouraged it” (Falco 207). If read with care and interest, the book offers hope that our world may contain more balance and empathy in the future.

Transcendent Gardening is available at CR Press.

Woman with Blonde hair in black turtleneck stands before blurred background of trees and sun.

Kenli Doss holds a BA in English and a BA in Theatre-Performance from Jacksonville State University. She is a freelance writer and actress based out of Alabama, and she spends her free time painting scenes from nature or writing poetry for her mom. Ken’s works appear in Something Else (a JSU literary arts journal), Bonemilk II by Gutslut Press, Snowflake Magazine, The Shakespeare Project’s Romeo and Juliet Study Guide and A Midsummer Night’s Dream Study Guide, and The White Cresset Arts Journal.

Sundress Reads: Review of Cartography of Trauma

Book cover with white background and sillouette of a woman depicted with green lines like a topigraphical map. On the top, the title Cartography of Trauma appears. At the bottom is the author's name, Ashley Hajimirsadeghi.

It isn’t every day I’m offered the chance to discover a new favorite book, and I am pleased to say I have found exactly that in Ashley Hajimirsadeghi’s Cartography of Trauma. Published by Dancing Girl Press in 2021, the collection has a handsome cover featuring a feminine silhouette mapped out in green lines in the topographical style. What’s on the inside captured my attention even further.

Cartography of Trauma depicts the way all generations of people, specifically women, navigate traumatic situations. Through metaphor, Hajimirsadeghi reveals common coping mechanisms to find where those experiences fit into everyday. Conceptually, the chapbook can be organized into three categories: Stranger poems (the subject of the poem does not appear to be related to the speaker in any way), Family poems (what it looks like when families are purged from their homes, uprooted in violence), and Self poems (snapshots of each speaker at one moment in time). These separate storytelling methods combine flawlessly in Cartography of Trauma to reflect the reader’s own hurt disguised as the trauma of a stranger. 

One of the Stranger poems, “His mother was strange,” reveals a mother’s sorrow in one tight column. Grief permeates the air around this poem like Chanel No.5 wafting from the poem’s subject – “Mad Molly” – who has a moment of inspiration. Hajimirsadeghi writes, “She says a mother’s / grief rings with the clamor of the / rusting church bells in the square / but no one listens” (5). It’s almost as if the reader experiences this silence like a thick cloud of perfume, strong and invasive and completely invisible. 

The poem “Diorama,” focuses readers’ attention onto the ills born into a family hardened by the violence of men. Hajimirsadeghi explores an imagined life where the speaker takes the place of family members wronged, a past where “Grandmother is alive and healthy, three-dimensional” and “Grandfather, too, isn’t an old revolutionary haunt” (8). Probably the most haunting line of this poem is just after the speaker imagines taking Grandfather’s place, saying, “I am bleeding in 1978 Iran,” and “I am bleeding in 2020 America” (8). The speaker compares this trauma, this fear and resentment which springs from the violence of men’s decisions, to life in America with just two lines.

“Encoded” features an American tradition, the “how are you” greeting which many know to be rhetorical, and the speaker’s response, both internal and external. In the poem, the greeting (“how are you?”) and the answer (“I’m fine,”) are separated by the speaker’s real truth: “I think I’m splintering” (Hajimirsadeghi 13). Hajimirsadeghi continues, “if Sylvia were alive she’d laugh… I think I’m eroding, dying to throw myself into the incinerator, end this hunger–” (13). To the speaker, “I’m fine” includes all of these hurts and wants and givings up, but all that a stranger hears is that “I’m fine.” This is sometimes how we cope, by lying to the world and pretending we are okay; Hajimirsadeghi’s poem captures this innocent need to appear okay even when we’re burning inside.

“Self-portrait in youth” is presented “in Technicolor” that is colored after the fact. When the reader imagines scenes depicting youthful romance, it is through the goggles of Technicolor; the past looks brighter and more colorful. “Self-portrait as lady vengeance” is directly opposite “in black & white.” It is stark, honest, simply representative. There is no romance, no fantasy. The speaker is dark and smudged and real. The last line hits the reader like a freight: “stop filming me. I don’t want you to see me cry” (Hajimirsadeghi 26). There is a lost fantasy here which leads to a crippling vulnerability. Nothing hides in black and white, so we use Technicolor to escape, to cope with reality.

The final Self poem, “Self-portrait as erasure,” is possibly the most brutally powerful of them all. The speaker describes “[bleeding] blue out on the patio, barefoot & dancing in the rainstorm” (27), a scene conflicted. A generally joyful activity such as dancing is depicted simultaneously with precious and dangerous loss, and this is the truth of Cartography of Trauma. This poem is the anthem of the world, especially the world of women, a world in which women dance in the storms we did not create and bleed black and blue for a sliver of joy in life’s great tempest. 

Cartography of Trauma uses accessible language and creative formatting to tell the story of women by a woman for women. And what an anthem it is. The last line of “Self-portrait as erasure” (and the entire book) sticks with me even in my sleep: “Ma, you wouldn’t // believe me if I set this place on fire tonight… just wait–” (27). The reader is left to wait in violent anticipation for the flames of this book to catch the world. 

Cartography of Trauma is avalible through Dancing Girl Press.

A white woman in a black turtleneck stares into the camera. The background is a blurred scene of trees and sun.

Kenli Doss holds a BA in English and a BA in Theatre-Performance from Jacksonville State University. She is a freelance writer and actress based out of Alabama, and she spends her free time painting scenes from nature or writing poetry for her mom. Ken’s works appear in Something Else (a JSU literary arts journal), Bonemilk II by Gutslut Press, Snowflake Magazine, The Shakespeare Project’s Romeo and Juliet Study Guide and A Midsummer Night’s Dream Study Guide, and The White Cresset Arts Journal.

Sundress Reads: Review of Four in Hand

Sundress Reads black-and-white logo with a sheep sitting on a stool next to the words "Sundress Reads." The sheep is wearing glasses and holding a cup filled with a hot drink in one hoof and holding an open book in the other.
A book cover that reads "Four in Hand" in white letters against a dark green background with a folded down piece of yellow in the top right-hand corner. "Poems" is written in yellow in a vertical line below the title and the author's name "Alicia Mountain" is written in black letters at the very bottom of the page against a white outline that wraps around the dark green and yellow.

Alicia Mountain’s new poetry collection Four in Hand (BOA Editions, 2023) is comprised of four heroic crown sonnets—a sequence of fifteen interlinking sonnets wherein the last line of the first sonnet is the first line of the next, and so on, and the fifteenth sonnet consists of the first lines of the previous fourteen. Quite a complicated structure indeed, and tricky to pull off, but Mountain does so masterfully. She weaves together eloquent, and at times archaic, language with urgent issues like late-stage capitalism, the pandemic, environmental devastation, LGBTQ issues and discrimination, drone strikes, the 2016 election, etc. with contemporary references and found text. Mountain also offers contemplations of familial structures, her gay poetic lineage, love and loss, as well as investigations of the self and place.  Aside from the political undercurrents and heavier themes, Four in Hand is also tender and personal suffused with numerous kinds of love, including the lingering love that persists even after heartbreak, “I offer to trade you / a poem for the story of the place we pressed / our bodies together.” This book feels like a necessary antidote to the crushing pressures and anxieties facing us today.

A narrative thread is braided through the book, submerging then reemerging signaled by motifs like “train tracks,” “the queen,” and “violet,” “which operate as anchors that ground the poems and refocus the reader’s attention. The form lends itself to this loose, nonlinear narrative and though each heroic crown appears disparate at first you begin to notice the intricate patterns as you read further.

Each sonnet rolls effortlessly into the next, turning the meaning of its last line to mean something completely different—even opposite—when it becomes the first line of the next sonnet. For example, the last line of the ninth sonnet in the first sequence “Train Town Howl” reads “whomever you love. They belong beside you,” which seems to be a lament that their ex-lover likely has a new lover. But in the next sonnet, the same line reads as well-wishing towards the lover rather than lamentation—the speaker is now expressing to their past lover that they deserve to be with someone they love, whomever it may be, and be happy. Mountain achieves this reversal of meaning simply by changing the sentence structure. As a last line “whomever you love” is part of the sentence that begins in the previous line, but as the first line of the tenth stanza, “Whomever you love” is the beginning of the sentence, starting a thought rather than completing one. It’s a tiny change but has a significant impact, which is a testament to the virtuosity of Mountain’s. The syntax is delicately crafted and each period, comma, line break, and word, and is intentional.

On the note of intentionality, while many sonnets in the collection resemble traditional sonnets, the sonnet form never feels tired because of Mountain’s experimentation. In the second sequence “Sparingly,” she pushes the boundaries of the form: each line consists only of a single word. A traditional sonnet puts pressure on the line as a unit, by using one word per line Mountain zeroes in on the word, forcing us to linger with each word and really notice them, hold on to each syllable, savor the sounds.

Despite the dark cloud of political instability, environmental degradation, and loss that permeates, Mountain finds moments of lightness and hope, especially in the “elementary poets” the speaker is teaching poetry. They like “butts and cats and killing” and the girls are “purple princes too.” This childhood silliness and wonder contrasts the “The sinister lever-pull that will not right us / came swift in November,” meaning the election of Donald Trump and the dividedness of the nation. Mountain asks, “How long has it / been since you worked for an hourly wage?” exemplifying the disconnect between the wealthy and the politicians and the rest of us. By posing this question and then going to work with eight-year-old poets, the speaker is deciding to do not be crushed by despair and do the important work of investing hope in the future, represented by the children, and in small but not inconsequential actions. Such a kernel of optimism is found when “Eight-year-old writes, We befriend enemy / countries like we were never enemies.” A vision of a more peaceful world without senseless violence—a better world.

Four in Hand is an epic, ambitious work, the opulent landscapes, gentle intimacy, and acute awareness of corruption and destruction that we are complicit in, “Often, I forget I am a benefactor / of war by birthright,” will percolate in your brain long after you’ve put the book down. It is a perfect alchemy of the personal and the political, of abundance and sparsity, of the quotidian and the extraordinary. Mountain demonstrates dexterity in both form, lyric, and blank verse while retaining a pleasurable cohesiveness. This book is achingly beautiful and exemplifies the magic of poetry—how at its best, poetry can touch you deeply; make you feel, and think, and cry, and hope, and yearn, and be glad to be alive.

Four in Hand is available from BOA Editions

Max Stone is in his final semester as an MFA candidate in Poetry at the University of Nevada, Reno. He received his BA in English with a minor in Book Arts and Publication from UNR in 2019. He is originally from Reno, but has lived in many other places since including, most recently, New York City. His poetry has been published in Black Moon Magazine, & Change, Fifth Wheel Press, Sandpiper Review, Night Coffee Lit, Caustic Frolic, and elsewhere. Max is also book artist and retired college soccer player.