Consider the Gravity

<p class=ql-align-justify>Linda Enders has given us a collection of poems for the trying times we live in. While these poems address issues such as climate change migrants seeking new homes and lives the losses and grief of death they also allow us to share in joyful memories take a quirky look at the paintings of Picasso and James McNeil Whistler hear the Hallelujah of Leonard Cohen and eavesdrop on the poet's request to speak to Louise Gluck in private. This collection is delightful and poignant insightful and inviting. Many of the poems are short tight and pack a punch concluding with lines like In the redwood's height and width/there's all the time in the world and The body fortifies itself to avoid the final call./The soul listens for the bell to ring. Reading this collection is very much like the final stanza of Autumn Shimmer: Early morning in autumn/when I open my window to the world/ the hummingbird flashes her colors/loops away into the mellow orange/of morning light--/Where is sorrow now? This is the question many of these poems ask addressing the contradiction and complication of our existence.</p><p class=ql-align-right>Anita Skeen 2023 Judge</p><p class=ql-align-right>Author of <em>Never the Whole Story</em>; </p><p class=ql-align-right><em>The Resurrection of the Animals</em>; </p><p class=ql-align-right><em>Outside the Fold Outside the Frame</em>; </p><p class=ql-align-right>and <em>Each Hand a Map</em></p><p class=ql-align-justify><br></p><p class=ql-align-justify><br></p><p><br></p>