Murmuration

<p>With incredible scope and stunning lyricism<strong> Erika Saunders</strong>'s poems intertwine the sea stone space with a lens always focused on love: we are the waves / crashing we are the castle walls / we are both the seal / and the shark stranded there / together on the moonlit beach. Erika's poems argue for the interconnectedness of all things. She examines cells with microscopic precision as cell recognizes cell and pulls / together tugged by the moon rhythm / of salt tides to rebuild the (w)hole. And she pulls out her telescope to examine the cosmos: calcified remains of dying / stars litter the watery surface / like cosmic confetti. These poems illuminate mystery and point towards meaning: If we can translate the murmur / into words we'll understand / destiny.</p><p><strong>-Jodi Andrews</strong> <em>Skin Reverberations</em></p><p></p><p></p><p><strong>Erika Saunders</strong>' poetry collection <em>Murmuration</em> is a paean to the gorgeous rushing swoop and torque of organic cycles: the baroque spiraling of starlings in murmuration; the departures and returns of birds in migration; seasonal birth and decay; gestational cycles; the ebb and flow of tides; the push and pull of the human heart. Here the ecological interconnectedness of life on our shifting planet is celebrated as exquisitely precious fleeting precarious and infinitely creative. This is a wonderful volume in which Saunders' attentive presence within small seemingly ordinary moments seeded in time and place emerges as both an act of grounding and an ecstatic surrender to infinitude.</p><p><strong>-Lee Ann Roripaugh</strong> Author of <em>tsunami vs. the fukushima 50</em></p><p></p><p></p>