Wednesday, February 04, 2015

The Dollhouse Mirror Poetry by Frank Watson






The Dollhouse Mirror
Poetry by Frank Watson
© 2014 by Frank Watson
Edited by Boris Komatina
Plum White Press
ISBN-13: 9781939832122
Sofbound, $12.95, 105 pages

Review by Zvi A. Sesling

Frank Watson has written a short (and short poems) volume of poetry which are easy to read and comprehend. There has always been something about short poems that has attracted me to them and Watson’s repertoire succeeds where many I have seen do not.

Here are a few examples of Watson short stuff:

we kiss
in silence

our memories
a journey

that ended
not long ago

------------------

floating in
the midnight smoke
I fade like
the howls of a wolf
on a long, blue night

--------------------

dust in the wind
on the day
we parted our ways

----------------------

the forest
curled up
into a story
of stranded souls
away from city lights
These poems are short, to the point and reveal something of Watson’s thought process and a perhaps unhappy romantic life. It also shows that somewhere buried in the past or present is a touch of depression or insecurity as in these two poems:

he waits
in the crevice
of earth
to sail out
on a gentler day

---------------------

he looks around
but the enemy
is within

And the final poem in the volume which I find sad and I prefer happy endings to poetry books:

there is time
enough for weeping
as the dust settles
and all the books
remain closed


Now while I interpret these poems to be about himself, it possible Watson is observing others and writing down his impressions. Either way they can be so true that a reader
finds himself within these poems.

Not quite haiku, Watson’s micro poetry is most likely eastern based and can be enjoyed as a quick read or a thought provoking set of poems. Though I must admit as one who likes titles, even when a poem’s title is “Untitled” the lack of any titles is a bit disconcerting to me, though probably not to many readers who will enjoy these poems for what they are.

________________________________________________________________________
Zvi A. Sesling

Author, King of the Jungle (Ibbetson St., 2010) and Across Stones of Bad Dreams (Cervena Barva Press, 2011), Editor, Muddy River Poetry Review,Editor, Bagel Bards Anthology 7& Bagel Bard Anthology 8.

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