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Dear All,
Dear All, is a book of moral urgency that eradicates the differences between private and public lives as it uncovers memory's distortions and inaccuracies. Maggie Anderson negotiates the perceptions and self-deceptions we live with and, through both humor and surprise, finds a way to bear them.
- GenresPoetry
87 pages, Paperback
Published September 5, 2017
11 people want to read
About the author
Maggie Anderson
40 books13 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
February 8, 2019
Dear All, by Maggie Anderson
This is Maggie Anderson's fifth book of poetry. Her work is a wonderful mix of what seems accessible on the surface but has puzzles and depths that are discernible only upon rereading. The title poem, "Dear All," addresses the array of people we have all known in life ("You who are the trees out the window to me," "You whom I failed to thank and you I failed to turn to"). The poem goes on gracefully, ending with:
I have remained steadfast here
I have remembered you wholly into this day.
I'm not even sure if I could analyze why this poem is so moving, but I found it very powerful. Likewise, the final poem, short and magical, uplifts like a deep breath, even in its mystery.
In between these two outstanding poems are many that are fully their equals: some probably autobiographical like "House of Drink," and the wonderful "Cleaning the Guns" about uncles who hunt and teach the young narrator how to name and clean the parts of the weapons. Other poems are about war, about poetry and poets. And some combine the literary and autobiographical like "My Father and Ezra Pound."
There is also a lot of nature, a lot of deep sensuality, much life experience, and many beautiful lines that work not by drawing attention to themselves, but by gently grabbing our coat lapels and drawing our attention to the world as Anderson sees it.
Maggie Anderson is perhaps the most trustworthy poet I know: it is always worth going into her poems, as deep as you can. She guides us in and brings us back refreshed, calmed, and with a new appreciation and apprehension of our lives.
This is Maggie Anderson's fifth book of poetry. Her work is a wonderful mix of what seems accessible on the surface but has puzzles and depths that are discernible only upon rereading. The title poem, "Dear All," addresses the array of people we have all known in life ("You who are the trees out the window to me," "You whom I failed to thank and you I failed to turn to"). The poem goes on gracefully, ending with:
I have remained steadfast here
I have remembered you wholly into this day.
I'm not even sure if I could analyze why this poem is so moving, but I found it very powerful. Likewise, the final poem, short and magical, uplifts like a deep breath, even in its mystery.
In between these two outstanding poems are many that are fully their equals: some probably autobiographical like "House of Drink," and the wonderful "Cleaning the Guns" about uncles who hunt and teach the young narrator how to name and clean the parts of the weapons. Other poems are about war, about poetry and poets. And some combine the literary and autobiographical like "My Father and Ezra Pound."
There is also a lot of nature, a lot of deep sensuality, much life experience, and many beautiful lines that work not by drawing attention to themselves, but by gently grabbing our coat lapels and drawing our attention to the world as Anderson sees it.
Maggie Anderson is perhaps the most trustworthy poet I know: it is always worth going into her poems, as deep as you can. She guides us in and brings us back refreshed, calmed, and with a new appreciation and apprehension of our lives.
December 3, 2017
I have loved Maggie Anderson's poetry forever, and her long-awaited newest collection did not disappoint me. In Dear All, Anderson explores loss and memory often recounting stories, imagined or not, of her life. Yes, we see stories of her youth in West Virginia, but we also see both the rural and urban landscapes of Pennsylvania and Ohio. Indeed, this collection could be summed up as a landscape of memory. Some truly beautiful poems!
December 11, 2023
Read this in one afternoon because I could not put it down, because the poems are that wonderful. Some of them, like "The Wave", will gut you. The pain of existence - personal, societal, global - is examined in ways fresh, searing, compassionate. Anderson writes poetry that helps you see this world we must live in. Highly recommended.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews