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juliasilge's review against another edition
4.0
I read so little poetry, but I am always glad when I do!! I especially loved some of the longer poems in this volume like "Martha" and "Poem for a Poet".
donasbooks's review against another edition
4.0
Without expectation
there is no end
to the shocks of morning
or even a small summer. p11
This slim but exceptional volume of poetry has been affecting my own writing style for weeks. I love how Lorde handles a line, and her syntax is dreamy.
When I first started reading COAL, I couldn't connect. So I walked around my house, blindly, reading the poems out loud, bruising my shins. But once I felt her lines and sentences in my own mouth, the tension of her diction, all the choices she put into those poems, coming out from between my lips--I was hooked. I knew what I was reading was something, as I already said, exceptional.
COAL is a poetry collection you read if you want to feel. It's not a sit and relax book. Audre Lorde was a black gay woman and wrote these poems bravely from a place of need, of desire, and of complexity.
With all that I love about this collection, I did not care for the last two sections, grief poems. One of these was an epic, entitled "Martha," which is technically good, but I felt lost in it several times. Who knows--maybe that was Lorde's intent; it's a grief poem. There's also one exception: the last poem in the book, entitled, "To a Girl Who Knew What Side Her Bread Was Buttered On."
What form! I love this, poem-letter form. I'm reading a whole collection of them right now; but Lorde's is the most stunning example I've seen. Hers is a short poem describing the figure in the greeting, which functions in this case a bit like glossing in chapters of fiction. The Poem tells the story of the girl: looked after by a pile of "old bones" and pursued by a too-old man--which one of them will capture her thrall? Well...the title has already told us, if we pay attention!
Rating 4 stars
Finished July 2022
Recommended to fans of modern poetry, contemporary poetry, and literary poetry; readers seeking diverse perspectives, black poetic voices
there is no end
to the shocks of morning
or even a small summer. p11
This slim but exceptional volume of poetry has been affecting my own writing style for weeks. I love how Lorde handles a line, and her syntax is dreamy.
When I first started reading COAL, I couldn't connect. So I walked around my house, blindly, reading the poems out loud, bruising my shins. But once I felt her lines and sentences in my own mouth, the tension of her diction, all the choices she put into those poems, coming out from between my lips--I was hooked. I knew what I was reading was something, as I already said, exceptional.
COAL is a poetry collection you read if you want to feel. It's not a sit and relax book. Audre Lorde was a black gay woman and wrote these poems bravely from a place of need, of desire, and of complexity.
With all that I love about this collection, I did not care for the last two sections, grief poems. One of these was an epic, entitled "Martha," which is technically good, but I felt lost in it several times. Who knows--maybe that was Lorde's intent; it's a grief poem. There's also one exception: the last poem in the book, entitled, "To a Girl Who Knew What Side Her Bread Was Buttered On."
What form! I love this, poem-letter form. I'm reading a whole collection of them right now; but Lorde's is the most stunning example I've seen. Hers is a short poem describing the figure in the greeting, which functions in this case a bit like glossing in chapters of fiction. The Poem tells the story of the girl: looked after by a pile of "old bones" and pursued by a too-old man--which one of them will capture her thrall? Well...the title has already told us, if we pay attention!
Rating 4 stars
Finished July 2022
Recommended to fans of modern poetry, contemporary poetry, and literary poetry; readers seeking diverse perspectives, black poetic voices
readerreaderonthewall's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
sad
medium-paced
4.0
roxyrox's review against another edition
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
5.0
Regretting that I ve discovered Audre Lorde so late.