Review by Carole Mertz It’s a welcome experience to discover so fine a collection of contemporary poetry written entirely in sonnet form. Kairos is a remarkable volume whose voice also reflects the training and inclinations of a classical musician. From the opening piece, “Anachronism,” onward, Libby Maxey presents poem after poem in uniformly skillful handling of form and meter. Maxey won the 2018 New Women’s Voices Competition by Finishing Line Press, for which the collection was created. Its charming cover depicts a branch in bud. “In the sanctuary, Amherst” tells of a musical situation: a rehearsal has just ended,…
Author: Mom Egg Review
Review by Christine Stewart-Nuñez The Shame of Losing, Sarah Cannon’s debut memoir, opens with her reaction to horrifying news: an accident at work has left her husband, Matt, clinging to life. The twin arcs of Matt’s physical recovery and the dissolution of their marriage follows. This book leaves readers with a profound sense of how one second can change the life of a family forever. I found a lot to admire in Cannon’s work. The hospital scenes, that show her reacting to the news of Matt’s traumatic brain injury, which happens just days before his 33rd birthday, gripped me. Cannon…
Review by Marjorie Tesser Raised in an observant Jewish household, Sarah Lightman realized that her biblical namesake, matriarch of her people, did not have a book of the bible named for her. In recognition and remedy, Lightman has named her book The Book of Sarah. The book is an idiosyncratic coming of age memoir in words and pictures, beginning at age ten. The quest for identity is a continuing thread as the narrative traces the author’s spiritual, social, and psychological evolutions in conjunction with her development and identity as an artist and, eventually, a feminist, mother and partner. Physically,…
Chasing the Merry-Go-Round: Holding on to Hope & Home When the World Moves Too Fast Author’s Note By Kelly Bargabos My heart has always been to tell the story of my brother, Bobby, so that people could see what life is truly like for someone like him. In a culture that has historically valued strength over weakness, intellect over character, and accomplishment over a simpler life, a segment of our population is systemically and repeatedly marginalized—unseen and unheard. When someone has physical disabilities that are invisible and intellectual limitations that aren’t always obvious, life is challenging in ways that most…
Chasing the Merry-Go-Round: Holding on to Hope & Home When the World Moves Too Fast by Kelly Bargabos Review by Laura Dennis Halfway into Chasing the Merry-Go-Round, I thought this was yet another story of someone (the author-narrator) trying to help someone else (her brother) without that person being ready to help himself. Knowing from personal experience that such efforts almost always fail, I wondered how it would end. Then came the suggestion of an explanation, followed by two diagnoses—Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS) and narcolepsy. I had fallen into the same trap as the author herself once had. I…
MER VOX QUARTERLY – SUMMER 2019 INTERVIEW: KEISHA GAYE-ANDERSON Curation and interview by JP Howard POETRY AND ART BY KEISHA-GAYE ANDERSON POETRY FOLIO: MOTHERHOOD AND GUILT Curated by Jennifer Martelli and Cindy Veach Marjorie Maddox, Rebecca Hart Olander, Jules Jacob, Meg Leonard, Cheryl Clark Vermeulen, E. Kristin Anderson GALLERY: ART BY NAOMI LAWRENCE Curated by Ana C.H. Silva AUTHOR’S NOTES Sarah Cannon On Writing The Shame of Losing Lara Lillibridge On Writing Mama, Mama, Only Mama BOOK REVIEWS
Motherhood and Guilt A MER VOX Folio Curated by Jennifer Martelli and Cindy Veach Is guilt inevitable when a mother spends time focusing on something other than her child/children? Is feeling guilty just part of the deal – one of the prices of mothering or being mothered? What does it take to push back against the notion that a mother is selfish if she pursues self-care, writing, a career? The poems in this folio ache with cognitive dissonance: the need to choose mothering over self, the need to choose self over mothering and the constant struggle to assuage the guilt.…
Interview, Poetry and Artwork featuring Keisha-Gaye Anderson Folio curated by JP Howard for Mom Egg Review VOX Online JP – Congratulations on your new books! I know that Everything is Necessary has just been published by Willow Books and your other collection, A Spell for Living, is forthcoming from Agape Editions. Tell us about the process for writing each book and the process leading up to publication for both. Keisha-Gaye – I’m quite excited to have both of these books coming out within the same calendar year. In terms of the process, I would say that the books emerged…
Art by Naomi Lawrence I admit I cyber-stalked Naomi Lawrence. Her flower creations started appearing around El Barrio, in NYC, about 2014, on metal fences; bright spots of improbably large flowers floating in front of abandoned lots. Blue iris, orange daylily, crocuses, cherry blossoms, daffodils, hibiscus, lotus, magnolia, and rose, thrilling in their audacity. My young daughters liked to point out the unexpected yarn art of their Spanish Harlem neighborhood to visiting playdates. City tree trunks, usually looking so sad in their untended pits, threatened by erosion, litter, and neglect, suddenly sported colorful stripes or patchwork, warmed and…
E. Kristin Anderson Southern Cold Tonight I want to take my feet beyond the answers, just as wild as the television. I keep writing. This bitter mouth shook your name from home, slowly here. And the room is throwing wide the world and living and dying and loving are left in shadowboxes down the hall. I could steal peppermint, a picture, the memory close at the door—but the sleepy sweet of fear at three in the morning is enough before dawn. Over the ache down my spine I forgive and hold grudges and know the spell to resist the…