Broken Dawn Blessings: Poems

by Adam Sol

Trillium Book Award–winning poet Adam Sol’s newest collection is made up of poems that are loosely linked to the traditional Jewish morning prayers, the Birkhot haShachar, which try to find moments of blessing in the midst of personal and public pain, shame, and worry How do we respond to others’ pain, both the pain of those we love and the larger global pain of those we don’t know? In a religious context, a witness can offer blessing when those in the midst of suffering cannot. Taking on the responsibility of blessing, then, is a way to shoulder that burden for the sufferer. This presupposes the idea that blessing is a necessity ― which may be a point up for debate. In the context of his wife’s recovery from surgery, and with civic violence prevalent in his city, the speaker of these poems leans on the structure of the Birkhot haShachar (dawn blessings) to carve out space for empathy, complaint, and occasional flashes of wonder. These poems showcase Sol’s trademark blend of humor and lyric virtuosity, and display his familiarity with Jewish texts and traditions, but add a new intimacy and urgency that break new ground for one of Canada’s most respected poets. It is his most risky and most accomplished collection to date.

Genres: Poetry, Canada

80 pages, Paperback

Published September 21, 2021

Reviews

[Cindy Crane · Rating 5 out of 5]

Broken Dawn Blessings: Poems by Adam Sol

The prayers of the Birkhot HaShachar written in Hebrew at the beginning of each poem, forming its title, anchor Sol’s poems to a structure that shape his strong feelings about his wife’s cancer and his city’s turmoil. His poetry takes you deep into the mind of a thinker, a poet. Non-poets would only see a sterile hospital visit and forget the other people sharing his painful journey, but Sol records his thoughts, ponders them, thinks about the significance of an apologetic security guard, why hospitals put rest area style pamphlets in waiting rooms, the mom hugging her sleepy kids goodbye at dawn, the nasty impatient nurse.
In one sentence he uses a mere five words lovingly constructed around the word heart, to tell us more about the type of woman his wife is, than a non-poet could in a whole paragraph.
By the end of the book, you will know how broken the author’s dawn is, as he seeks for new hope for each new day. As he looks for deliverance in the form of an ark to ride out the floodwaters of his life.
Sol’s poem shows us that up-close events as well as distant events both have the power to impact a heart.
One poem about the baby robin Sol names The Little President takes us from the realm of ordinary life to the tension he feels at watching the baby who can control its world, while he cannot control the consequences of his wife’s disease.
You too will be drawn into the mind of a true poet as he translates thoughts in the soul that the Absent Manager gave him to evocative words on the page that have the power to draw us into his pain, his world.
His poems grapple with the inconsistencies of life, such as, Why do we eat living creatures, why do we take life to sustain our own?
His poetry allows us to see life through the lens of a master poet, one who thinks deeply and feels strongly, especially about the wife and sons he loves.
I marvel at how the mind of a poet works, and thoroughly enjoyed this insight into Sol’s troubled world.

[Rebecca Rosenblum]

I will never stop thinking about *Jeramiah, Ohio*, Sol's brilliant collection from 2008 that is one of my favourites ever by anyone, but I think I could grow to like this quiet, moving collections just as much in time. I really sat with it and thought about the poems, which is hard for me to do. So smart, sad, funny, grim, and wise--a marriage of public and private griefs and hopes. Really a lovely, loving book.

[TaraReadsBooks · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good book of poems! I really loved the meditation on the existence of God and all the names the poet came up for to address God. I google-translated the Hebrew as I went and it was cool to see how the titles and themes so closely followed the Birkhot HaSchachar (Blessings of the Dawn, Jewish morning prayers).

[Penn Kemp]

From the very private to the public view from his porch, how to begin the day with a blessing prayer:

The higher planes are not to be explained.
So we burrow deeper and pray for change.”
“Whale Fall Suspension”

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was interested by the ideas of these poems bringing it the aspects of daily prayer.
I also liked the connection to Toronto - many of the images, places, people and situations are so familiar to me. Although overall I did not feel connected to these poems

[julia! · Rating 4 out of 5]

I want to play Scrabble with my professor, and talk about poems.