Post by moira on May 16, 2008 22:10:48 GMT 2
Mortal
Ivy Alvarez[/b]
In her remarkable first collection, Ivy Alvarez examines the relationship between Dee and Seph -- modern-day reinventions of Demeter and Persephone -- and how the specter of breast cancer affects them. Mortal spans years and personalities, giving voice to mother and daughter in poems that are both visceral ("they had to unzip me / to let the cat / out of the bag // blood bathed my belly") and quietly elegant ("how do I hold you / I wonder, as I'm holding you").
Sample poem:
fossil
the day of her arrival is a fossil.
exposed, it erodes
it crumbles apart
grain by grain
this grain is the metal mouth of the aircraft
the attendant is on autopilot and leads her in, blank and smiling
this grain is the plane
scrying over a landscape of night and day
this grain is the tarmac-memory on which she stands
she watches the wind harden in the windsock-mouth
this grain is her mother; 'this is your new home,' she cries out,
her cries and her smiles are mixed in her mouth; fears for her child
ten grains equal ten years
left behind.
the grains fall,
become one with the dust.
Reviews for Mortal:
I would like to welcome Ivy Alvarez's luminous contribution to the long list of poets who have taken the Persephone and Demeter myth and made it their own. From Alfred Lord Tennyson to Edna St Vincent Millay, and most recently, Rita Dove, we can add Ivy Alvarez's elegant footsteps as marks that will endure.
-- Nick Carbó
Sharpness of perception, whether of taste, eye or ear, is what defines this tightly written collection. The sharpness of the heart as mothers and daughters strain to find continuity, the sharpnesses of a sometimes painful, sometimes delightful present, and the deep poignancies of memory, are incised across these poems. Here's a striking new voice to accompany us from Hades to Tasmania, from myth to mother.
-- WN Herbert
Ivy Alvarez's Mortal re-envisions myth, present voice calling to ancient voice, and vice versa. Alvarez is an ambitious poet who challenges herself and her readers, while exploring the complexities of families through persona. Mortal is a stunning first book.
-- Denise Duhamel
About the author:
Ivy Alvarez is the author of Mortal (Red Morning Press, 2006). Her poetry is featured in anthologies, journals and new media in many countries. The recipient of numerous awards, prizes and residencies, Ivy Alvarez has received funding for her second poetry manuscript from both the Australia Council and the Welsh Academi.
In 2006, Wales Arts International supported her participation in the Red Room Company’s The Poetry Picture Show in Sydney, Australia. Fundación Valparaíso has also invited her to attend a writing residency in Spain during April 2008.
In 2005, she received prestigious residency fellowships from MacDowell Colony (USA) and Hawthornden Castle (UK). She also accepted an Arvon Foundation bursary and the honour of Special Poetry Guest to Dublin’s Trinity College/Florida International University poetry summer program in 2004. Her poem ‘earth’ appears in the 2004 Australian/Pacific Region Literacy Placement Test for Scholarships, initially selected from the anthology Moorilla Mosaic: Contemporary Tasmanian Writing.
Website
ISBN 978-0-9764439-2-6, 63 pages, $12.00
Red Morning Press, paper
[glow=teal,2,300]BUY HERE, BUY NOW:[/glow]
Red Morning Press: tinyurl.com/3jwxhd[/font]