Category: Poetry

You Are A Sacred Place by Madeleine Jubilee Saito

subtitled Visual Poems For Living In Climate Crisis. It’s always a refreshing surprise to me whenever someone professes belief in both Christianity and climate change. Of all the major faiths, mainstream (and especially Evangelical) Christianity has always struck me as the one least interested in responsible custodianship of the planet, as it focuses more on …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2025/06/26/you-are-a-sacred-place-by-madeleine-jubilee-saito/

In The Bone-Cracking Cold by M Bartley Seigel

Wow, reading this poetry collection really brought up a lot of issues I have with media and identity, none of which are meant to cast aspersions on this book at all, but which definitely distracted from my enjoyment of it. So let’s table that discussion for at least the end of this review, and discuss …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2025/06/18/in-the-bone-cracking-cold-by-m-bartley-seigel/

If You Knew My Name by Lisa Roberts Carter

I honestly don’t recall the last time I read a novel in verse, but I’m glad I broke that spell with this powerful debut! Mason Zy’Aire Tyndall is a high school senior who has two goals: hone his battle rap skills to better fit the “Legend” moniker he’s working on and find a cute girl …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2025/02/05/if-you-knew-my-name-by-lisa-roberts-carter/

Sitting On A Rock by Gary L Brinderson

Oh poetry, thou fickle siren, luring thousands of writers into your gentle-seeming embrace only to let them flounder on the sharp rocks of skill that underpin you. So here’s the deal, dear readers. Poetry is about image and emotion. Back in the day, it also used to be about form and rhyme. For better or …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2024/10/30/sitting-on-a-rock-by-gary-l-brinderson/

The Totally Not Boring Book Of Feelings by Jolie Taylor & Brandon Dorman

What a delightful way to get kids in touch with their feelings! And this, mind you, is said by someone who has definitely given books about feelings, especially those targeted at kids, the hairy side eye, usually for being too sappy and twee. This collection of roughly 40 poems easily avoids that pitfall, while being …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2024/09/09/the-totally-not-boring-book-of-feelings-by-jolie-taylor-brandon-dorman/

Reborn by Abraham Rodriguez

On the one hand, I’m happy for the interest in poetry that the viral success of Rupi Kaur has brought mainstream. On the other, well, you get the feeling that everyone feels that they can write poetry now. And yes, to a certain extent, everyone can write poetry. But too often writers confuse epigraphs with …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2024/08/16/reborn-by-abraham-rodriguez/

The Iliad translated by Emily Wilson

The Iliad by Emily Wilson

Introducing her translation of The Iliad, Emily Wilson gets right to the heart of the matter. “The beautiful word minunthadios, ‘short-lived,’ is used of both Achilles and Hector, and applies to all of us. We die too soon, and there is no adequate recompense for the terrible, inevitable loss of life. Yet through poetry, the …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2023/12/31/the-iliad-translated-by-emily-wilson/

Gay Poems For Red States by Willie Carver

or Willie Edward Taylor Carver Jr as he’s credited on the cover of this volume. In 2022, Willie Carver was named Kentucky Teacher of the Year. A homophobic vendetta led by just one woman caused him to decide, only months later, to leave the public school system, but not before testifying before Congress about the …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2023/06/15/gay-poems-for-red-states-by-willie-carver/

Under Her Skin edited by Lindy Ryan & Toni Miller

A Women In Horror Poetry Collection, Volume I Usually when I read poetry, I read in great big chunks, especially when reading a collection from one of my favorite poets. Even larger anthologies from different writers go by quickly, or at least in big thematic pieces. So I was a little surprised, but not in …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2023/05/12/under-her-skin-edited-by-lindy-ryan-toni-miller/

Human Chain by Seamus Heaney

Human Chain by Seamus Heaney

So here I am at the end of Seamus Heaney’s major collections. I came via the sideways path, the one that starts with his Nobel lecture, which is brilliant, and has repaid many re-readings. It took me through Finders Keepers a collection of his prose, and then through his Beowulf. I no longer remember just …

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Permanent link to this article: https://www.thefrumiousconsortium.net/2023/04/09/human-chain-by-seamus-heaney/