Little Climates

by L.A. Johnson

The lyric poems of Little Climates address the divisions between the self and the world, the self and the lover, and self with the self. In her debut collection, L. A. Johnson examines of the disparate spaces humans occupy in relationships: together and separately, alone and as unit. Each partner’s past, how they’ve changed, how they dream of the present—these are the little climates.

Genres: Poetry

36 pages, Paperback

First published November 14, 2017

About the author

L. A. Johnson is from California. She received her MFA from Columbia University and is currently pursuing her PhD in literature and creative writing from the University of Southern California, where she is a Provost’s Fellow. Her poems have recently appeared or are forthcoming in The American Poetry Review, Antioch Review, The Iowa Review, Narrative Magazine, The Southern Review, and other journals.

Reviews

[John Taylor · Rating 5 out of 5]

These poems are a gift. Little Climates is a joy to read. It's been on my nightstand since March, and I've been through the book a number of times. I very much recommend it.

[Joseph · Rating 4 out of 5]

(4.5 stars) One of the dangers of writing poems that address relationships, self-reflection, and local landscapes and are described as "slow, quiet poems," is that the author can fail to invite the reader into such intensely interior lyrics and, paradoxically, because Johnson writes about such universal themes, there is the danger that the experience of reading her poems won't offer the reader any revelatory surprises. However, she succeeds brilliantly in balancing these dangers by offering such rich image and lyrics as ("Physics cannot explain midnight ideas (Auroras)"; "The inevitable lurks in me. Abnormal cells divide/ with speed. I trust the accidental as a greater paradise (Mutation)"; "...What is/ fidelity if not a decision against this life (Impermanence)"). Only rarely do individual poems fall flat ("Specialists were called to examine the drying parts/ and fibrous knobs with expensive metal tools (Evaporation)"). I love when poets take on the quotidian elements of daily life like a painter trying her hand at a still life of a bowl of fruit and see if they can add vitality and an interesting perspective to these everyday concerns. I can't wait to see Johnson's first full collection to see if she can continue to entrance with her vision and perspective.

[Claudia Putnam · Rating 5 out of 5]

So, let's think of parts of ourselves, our relationships, our places, as ecotones. Do they form wholes of their own? What is their relationship to other wholes that extend across the parts of our lives?

From "Night Passage":

....
Later still, I saw the bed of the buck thinning, witch-grass

finally rising after so many months of tamping down--
his disappearance as unexplained as his arrival,

while my own presence became more silhouette
than solid. ....

(And wasn't "witch-grass" a goosebumpy choice? How perfect is that?)

From "Shapeshift":

iv.
Under white pines, a fox tears at the carcass,
working his way down from the throat.
His hunger abides in my blood.

From "Hush":

....
This evening could go on forever,
like the plastic cord of a telephone
I used to wind around my wrist,
....

[E.B. · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book. L.A. Johnson’s poems are magic.

[Frances · Rating 5 out of 5]

With a spare elegance, L.A. Johnson creates vivid, beautiful poems that bring you back to them over-and-over.