Watershed

<p class=ql-align-justify>In his first volume Tyler Dillow adroitly gathers his sundry poems together as a Watershed. A watershed is a perfectly conceived title to illuminate this particular collection but we might also note that it is a perfect analogy for the unity that underlies any poetry collection. A watershed in its American usage is all the land whose snow and rainfall drains into the same body of water and it includes both the networks of surface streams and the groundwater and subterranean aquifers that feed those streams. It thus represents the organic unity of a place as defined not by political boundaries and human concepts but by its intrinsic being and source. To apply the metaphor to the realm of poetry books: On the surface we may identify a variety of subjects modes and themes (wildly divergent cities towns and principalities) but if there is a distinctive artistic intelligence flowing through the work it will all share that source and move as one body of water. </p><p class=ql-align-justify><br></p><p class=ql-align-justify>-Sam Taylor</p><p class=ql-align-justify>Wichita Kansas</p><p class=ql-align-justify>April 17 2022</p><p class=ql-align-justify><br></p><p class=ql-align-justify><br></p><p class=ql-align-justify><br></p><p class=ql-align-justify><br></p><p><br></p>