Caduceus

by Sørina Higgins

Higgins, Sárina

Genres: Poetry

100 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 2012

About the author

Dr. Sørina Higgins is an editor, writer, English teacher, and scholar of British modernist literature. She once founded and ran a University Press and has served as a writing tutor and consultant for everything from doctoral dissertations to a Jungian dream-journal. Her academic work focuses on Charles Williams (The Oddest Inkling) and magic in modern drama.

She is currently revising a volume of short stories, Shall these Bones Breathe?, and previously published two books of poetry: Caduceus & The Significance of Swans.

Sørina lives on a homestead in upstate New York with her husband, a brace of cats, and a chattering of chickens.

Reviews

[John Thieme · Rating 5 out of 5]

I came upon a review of this collection that described Higgins' poems as "gorgeously kilned" and wholeheartedly agree--these are beautifully and cleverly crafted, profoundly insightful, and rich in imagery. Higgins explores some of the deepest epistemological questions about the nature and essence of art, of beauty, of Christian faith, and love at the edge of heartbreak--in her words:

...shaken with the kind of weeping
that is as red as the inside of a broken body,
gold as threads of life unraveled, shaped
like shattered windows or unfinished songs. Lovely,
and unendurable.

Each poem offers a cathartic discovery impacted by the competing dualities of infinite and finite, pain and love, beauty and rage--and in the shadows of God and mythological gods, the fate of being truly frail and truly human.

[Brenton · Rating 5 out of 5]

This remains, on rereading, one of my favourite books of contemporary poetry. It is lamentably short, but there is a strong sophistication to the imagery--elevated, yet rooted very much in embodied life.

[John Caperella · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very entertaining and insightful book of poems. Will read it again and again. Favorites include “Psyche's Sunlight” (great use of Cupid's garden as entering in relationship/falling in love), “Electrical Work” (a fun little poem that address a fact that all must face: the hard sciences can say what is, but not why; they cannot tell us the meaning of it), “Crough Patrick” (an epic quest story/poem that makes my Irish-American heart bleed), “Mordred Makes Confession” (very sinister and true to the Arthurian traditions), “Incarnation” (great use of contrast), and lastly “Mappa Mundi” (pure epicness).

[Richard Berrigan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Higgins produces a scholar's delight in "Caduceus". Using art to contemplate and explore art, as well as larger questions of Christianity, Higgins dons several disguises as a way of revealing the multifaceted elements of the Christian artist, and she structures her book in such a way as to replicate these facets (the skeptic, the lover, the believer, the Roman, etc.) As she notes in "Carmen Rehearses Her Monologue"

Don't mistake the dancer for the dance:
do not confuse the singer with the song

Higgins' poetry is rife with allusions to classical works of various mediums, and it rewards multiple readings. Highly recommended.

[J. Wootton · Rating 4 out of 5]

These poems alternate between contemplations of human arts, by means of which the poet seeks an understanding of the possible Art which is Reality/Existence and its sublimate Artist, and more direct writings on Christianity (these latter kind very nearly dropped my rating to three stars).

By turns brilliant and over-ambitious, Caduceus is a fine collection and I look forward to Higgins' next.

Here, here: put on my sweater, lest I freeze.

[BeckyT · Rating 5 out of 5]

This collection of poems offers a gorgeous, condensed version of the best conversations with Sorina Higgins: The intensity and depth of her questions, her powerful love of language, and her flexibility as she considers a question from wide-ranging vantage points. This is a collection to return to with joy again and again.