Passions: Love Poems and Other Writings

by Gabriela Marie Milton

-Christina Schwarz, the author of the New York Times Bestseller Drowning Ruth, on Gabriela’s “With lush language and lavish imagery, Gabriela Marie Milton evokes a fantastic world ripe with emotion."
-Brian Geiger, editor of Vita “This is a mesmerizing collection of poetry. Gabriela Marie Milton’s lines teem with life, passion, and introspective courage.

Genres: Poetry

150 pages, Paperback

Published April 20, 2020

About the author

Gabriela Marie Milton is an Amazon bestselling poet and an internationally published author. She is the author of the #1 bestselling poetry collection Woman: Splendor and Sorrow: | Love Poems and Poetic Prose (Vita Brevis Press, 2021) and the author of Passions: Love Poems and Other Writings (Vita Brevis Press, 2020). She edited the #1 Amazon bestsellers, Wounds I Healed: The Poetry of Strong Women(EIF, 2022) and Hidden in Childhood: A Poetry Anthology (Literary Revelations, 2023). She was awarded 2019 Author of the Year at Spillwords Press (NYC). Her piece "If I say I love you" was nominated for 2020 Spillwords Press Publication of the Year (Poetic). Gabriela was featured multiple times in New York Glamour Magazine.

Reviews

[D. Peach · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are poetry books where the words feel like chocolates that melt on your tongue, where the imagery seduces you into a timeless place of mystery or lays out a universe of emotion, the crux of a life in a few perfect lines. I love free verse that’s evocative, where the sounds and rhythms sweep me off my feet. Gabriela Marie Milton’s poetry is and does all those things.

The book is set up into three parts. First, Love Poems, a generous collection of free verse that took my breath away. Part two has side-by-side poems, one in English, the other its Italian translation. And Part three has short prose that honestly, reads like poetry. All of it is sublime.

And none of it should be rushed. I read this collection over two weeks, savoring each offering in the darkness before sleep. A luxurious read for anyone who loves poetry and beautiful words.

[Victoria Ray · Rating 5 out of 5]

A real treasure for poetry lovers!
The book “Passions: Love poems and other writings”by Gabriela Marie Milton is absolutely beautiful collection of poetry and will move you beyond words. If you love music - there’s “Waltz” for you there, if you struggle with depression - there’s “Autumn Neurosis”… and if you look for smart, romantic, passionate writing - there’s “Amour”, silently followed by “Confession”.
Its modern and classical, about how we lived yesterday and how to live tomorrow. There is a huge amount of wisdom within the pages of this book and if you’ll live by the lessons of love taught there - I’m sure, you’ll live a much richer life. Try reading it aloud, with your soulmate or friends… or just keep it closer to your bed and heart.

If you are a true poetry lover - don’t wonder and don’t wait - get the book.

[Roisin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful poetry. True refreshment.

[Cassa Bassa · Rating 5 out of 5]

A stunning collection!

There is no fast reading for this collection. It is so rich and vast. I savour each piece like delicate sweets with home brewed espresso by my window sill at dusk. Bravo! I cannot wait to read more from Gabriela!

[Suzette Benjamin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gabriela Marie Milton

I give this book a five star rating for the following reasons.

I was impressed straight away, when in the forward, the author was compared to Robert Graves idea of an excellent poet. Portions of this work have been translated from Italian.
This is a book of love poetry with a special nuance of being written for the reader. Poetry often transcribes and chronicles the author's epiphanies.

"The Miracle of you" in its expression of "the love of water and flowing rivers" typifies a portion of these poems. Other poems, indeed most, have an historical forefront in its images that speaks to the impacts of colonialism in the new world (then and now). The depth of love in its forgiveness of past hurts is explored in almost each poem. The fruit of love demonstrated as a final willingness to let go. Not as in accepting wrong but letting go of the burden of unforgiveness ("Soul Bonds," "Fires of the Mind,"and "Attention." A strand/ path to healing links this work from piece to piece.
The poetry and writings also take an historical journey to the east and to the west. Exploring frontiers of love in the vicissitudes of life. An exploration of the upheaval that charting new shores, have inspired in the minds of those who love their homeland far and near. A love of home wherever that might be, persists in this book.

The poetry and other writings do not cover the sins of the victors of conquest but it outlines the power of love to forgive. Above all, love is the tincture this ailing world needs. This book of poems brings home this point in beautiful imagery of water, sea, sand and travel (through time, space and journeys of the heart).
Highly recommend. A great read!

[Dave Williams · Rating 5 out of 5]

Let’s say you’ve walked through a few houses with blank walls. Maybe these are show houses in a new development in town. The blankness of the houses reminds you of routines: doing the same things every day, eating the same foods.

Then you enter a house with tapestries hanging on the walls. The tapestries are filled with vibrant images and suggestions of senses. That’s the kind of feeling given by “Passions: Love Poems and Other Writings.” Each poem is like a tapestry.

You walk up to each tapestry and absorb the images woven into the fabric. Some images emit aromas (cinnamon, “braid my hair with smells of lavender and roses”). Some images invite touch sensations (wind, “running barefoot on cobblestone streets”). Others conjure sounds (purring cat, whispers, “you make pianos sneeze old rhapsodies”). Others serve up tastes (passion fruit, “destinies melt in the taste of coffee and mistrust”). Others peek into places around the world (Florence, Granada, Rio de la Plata).

These poems are celebrations of language, locations, emotions, and senses. These are Flamenco dancers, characters from myths, kisses, flowers, wooden beds, a woman being called Beatrice and wishing that was her name, “pigeons guide ships lost at sea,” wine, dreams, and a lot more.

The poems invite you to take in the images from those tapestries. Remove each tapestry from the wall and wrap it around you. For these bright emotions and senses enrich our lives. These keep our lives from become stale, monotonous.

Most of the book is comprised of Ms. Milton’s poems, but there are two other sections. One includes poems by Flavio Almerighi, and these are split into columns: English translation on the left and the Italian version on the right.

The final section includes prose poems and flash fiction. The rich language continues in these, now with more narrative to sew together more concrete scenes. I enjoyed the poems, and I enjoyed these fiction pieces more. I felt the fictional pieces were easier for me to enter the scenes and take in what was happening there.

This is a lovely book that’s like taking a vacation from the ordinary.

[Ty Gardner · Rating 5 out of 5]

A dazzling chandelier of poetic work, Passions: Love Poems and Other Writings, is truly a wonder to behold! I first encountered Gabriela's amazing aptitude for rich descriptive prose in her short-form stylings within the writing community on Twitter. Her work began to make its way into my newsfeed slowly, and before long, I was taken with her language and incredible diction. I began to follow her efforts more closely and soon discovered that her wealth and reverence for articulation transcended the realm of Twitter and onto the pages of this stunning book. The nuances that transpire in each poem are gorgeous, truly breathtaking. One such line that reads, "bartenders polish glasses trying to remember where exactly they belong...," invited me to set my reading aside and exhale a lifetime of lamentations. And it so it went, again and again, beautiful vignettes that incited small collapses of emotion and stole my breath away. I particularly enjoyed the pieces translated into Italian. It was nice to see the English version side-by-side with its Italian counterpart. Something about seeing them together like that enriched the piece even more. Gabriela has inscribed a touching tribute to not only life and love but a variety of many other remarkable truths that one can only discover along the journey to understanding their humanity.

[Mark Bierman · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’m one that habitually looks for hidden meanings in descriptions and words. This is where I had to adapt this thinking and do what Brian Geiger has suggested, “to experience rather than explain.”

Once absolved of these tendencies, I was able to fully immerse into the abstract, yet well-mastered palette of imagery, orchestrated by this gifted poet. Here is just one example:

Nordic Play

an island shimmers on the Nordic Sea

your eyes are madness and pale blue

under your fingers the piano

ennobles pain and makes the snow to fall

play the melancholy of winter

white adulterated by a frozen mauve

I’ll make the bed and walk in silence

to the place of roses and cinnamon

don’t follow me

remain and play under the blues of winter

the scented mystery of all the women

who never knew

the fires hidden

in the glaciers of your soul

I highly recommend this book for anyone who savors astral projection to wolf moonlit plains and sun ripened vines of tomatoes bursting with the flavors of scintillating verse.

Five stars!

[Leon Tefft · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book proved to be a fine collection of love poems from an obviously talented and accomplished contemporary poet. Each poem succeeded in grabbing my interest since they are written with perhaps the single favorite component I enjoy in poetry – imagery. Gabriela’s poems paint vivid pictures that provoke deeper thought and contemplation.

There is also a section of prose poems and flash fiction that are equally entertaining, written with the same stylish rigor apparent throughout the book.

The book itself is formatted well and is pleasing to read. The publishers did a fine job developing and producing this book. It’s a nice addition to my poetry collection.

[Ingrid Wilson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gabriela’s writings stir the heart, ignite the memory and fire the imagination. Tales of passion played out in the streets of ancient cities, heady floral scented nights and the salt foam of the sea. Highly recommended!

[Lara]

Passions: Love Poems and Other Writings, by Gabriela Marie Milton, is a beautiful book that talks mainly of love and its infinite ways of touching each one of us. It also depicts the true depth of human relationships and emotions, how passion can be malleable, intense, and sometimes difficult to understand completely. What I think is one of the greatest achievements of this book is the diversity it has when it comes to writing: love poems, prose poems, flash fictions, and poems translated in Italian.

The poems are brief, carrying such perceptive and sensorial imagery that they give off the impression of being constantly and infinitely expanding themselves to the universe. They talk about love and how wonderful it is, but also about the disagreements and complexities that come with it. Each poem unfolds different scenery with its very own landscape and emotions. It offers a full repertoire of sensations to explore with all the human senses. The reader will be able to smell, touch, see, taste, and hear everything that the poem narrates, transforming the reading into a unique experience. “Those roses which die in the winter/played the piano last night/a whirlpool of notes and of poems/inscribed on a wall painted in blue” (p.26) Reading these lines, it feels as if you were immersed on them, surrounded by those roses and the whirlpool of notes and poems. Closer to the end of the book you have the Prose Poems and Flash Fiction. These are short stories written in poetic prose, which is a hybrid genre of writing that mixes the attributes and structures of both prose and poetry, meaning you can find short stories divided into brief paragraphs or separated into lines on the page, which is the process known as lineation, used when writing poetry. The stories narrated in these sections address issues like the strength of character, loneliness, obsession, love, family, and every little thing that comes with human relationships. It is exceptionally and beautifully written and it completely captivates the reader and makes him feel the same way the poet does.

The poems and the flash fiction are highly aesthetic, sometimes even rhythmical, and its unique quality is the ambiguity that they offer. It is poetry that suggests multiple interpretations of the words that it uses, and by doing this, it evokes a lot of emotive responses from the reader. Apart from the main topic that the poems address, which is love, they also have abundant cultural references. For example, when Astraea is named, which is a goddess from Greek mythology, or the Guadalquivir which is a Spanish river, or even García Lorca, a famous poet. The writer of this book uses symbolism, alliteration, and other figures of speech such as metaphor, metonymy or simile brilliantly and intellectually. She creates a complex yet excellent layering of meanings, forming connections between the verses that were not previously perceived, and it also establishes a resonance or even similarity between images that may seem disparate when you first read them. It is a wonderful book to read if you are interested in a kind of poetry with universal meaning and value.

I recommend this book to poetry lovers who are looking for a kind of poetry that mixes all kinds of different elements, creating a new way of perceiving love. In this book, love can be found everywhere: on the trees or the river, in the soul or inner self, in the scary darkness, in every city of the world. The poems that this book offers are wonderful because they can show the complexity of love and its many branches. I wouldn’t recommend this book to someone who has just started reading poetry because he may find it hard to discover the underlying connections between the verses or understand the very complex and advanced lexicon this poetry has.

I rate the book 5 out of 5 stars because, on the one hand, it is evident that it was professionally edited, with no spelling mistakes whatsoever or errors in the typing. On the other hand, the one I consider the most important aspect of the book, is that it represents the essence of poetry with its characteristic sensitiveness and diverse, heartfelt meanings. Gabriela Marie Milton proves to be an impressive, very intelligent, sensitive, and perceptive writer and without her, this book wouldn’t be what it is now: a beautiful, creative and unique book.