To the Marrow
Published in 2023 by cyber wit.net
Author’s Description
At the heart of the my amazement with whatever I am observing — a heron, a pod of beached whales, a man plowing his field — is an encounter with the world’s beauty, cruelty, indifference, and mortality. How does one take heart? These poems suggest facing fears, sorrows and longings and embracing them honestly as we dig into the marrow of our being, our experience.
Reviews
In this wonderful book full of wit and wisdom, poet Diana Cole offers an inclusive and forgiving approach to life’s joys and sorrows. Even as her poems begin in a deeply skeptical voice, they often conclude in celebration. In fishing for cod one night, she notes the brutal reality of reeling in a fish, smashing its head and tossing it in the pail. But at the same time, she savors the night sky, the texture of the water, the fishing line glimmering in the moonlight: “This is how beauty is/ without censure…" In a different poem, she contemplates dreary November days; trees without leaves, sky without sun and finds an important truth in this spare environment: “Relinquish, reconcile." The tone of the book is captured at the beginning with the hopeful words of Rainer Maria Rilke: “Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer." With Cole’s questions, I found myself reaching for my own answers and find, along with the poet, celebration, beauty, and serenity to meet the moment at hand.
— Tony Allen, Founder of Barrington Books (Rhode Island)
This chapbook provides what we look for in poetry. In a number of elegant short poems, Diana Cole provides close observation of the natural world and human nature, deft employment of noun and verb to create fresh metaphors, and insights that light up the page and the imagination. It’s a slim volume but it contains splendors.
— James M. Cronin, Author: World of Shadows