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jessthanthree's review
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
5.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Death
Minor: Medical content and Terminal illness
earlydecember's review
reflective
medium-paced
4.0
Winter Recipes is a quiet, chapbook-length collection of prosaic yet lyrical poems about loss and aging with an emphasis on family and friendship. It would be easy to fall into a pit of nostalgia, but Glück remains reflective without being saccharine or sentimental. Similarly to her 2006 collection, Averno, where Roman and Greek mythology frames her thoughts on grief and mother/daughter relationships, Winter Recipes references Chinese philosophy and parables to describe the certitude of death and senescent.
This is a stunning addition to Glück's body of work and continues themes from other collections, but it is not my most-loved book by her. That, of course, does not make it any less good. To end, here is a moment from one of my favorites, An Endless Story:
…There was a bird, she said.
Someone is supposed to kiss it.
[…] Once it is kissed
it becomes a human being. So it cannot fly;
it can only sit and stand and lie down.
[…] That was a bad trade, she said,
the wings for the kiss.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death and Grief
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