Sailing On the Edge of Time, I Hear a Siren's Call

by Tim Heerdink

A lone sailor hears a siren's call while adrift at sea in this long poem told in journal entries as waves of madness grow with the passing days.

"A wind-etched, sea scarred feel of oft-repeated ballads reaches out of “Siren’s Call.” Yet poet Tim Heerdink’s chiseled voice is equally modern, deeply landing on that isolated dread so many share in the year of Covid-19. Heerdink pens breathtaking lines that land hard and true, for we have all spent a season or more adrift of late:

I can’t remember the face

of the girl I left at home.

It’s been far too long

& this journey has failed

with the goal of bringing

salvation.

What lasts in “Siren’s Call” is a feeling of survival against the odds. We cough, we gasp, but then, in song, we experience some transcendence that happens only after throwing away our ancient compass. “I toss it overboard,” the poet writes. “What use remains when I have this magnificent melody?”

With cinematic shadows and raw glimpses of light—which are ultimately a call to trust—Heerdink proves himself in “Siren’s Call” to be a master at conveying the painful, yet inevitably hopeful, beauty that comes with being a sensing, feeling creature in the midst of an ocean of cold uncertainty."

- Amy Alexander, author of NEVERLAND IS ALWAYS AN ISLAND

20 pages, Paperback

Published March 23, 2021

About the author

Tim Heerdink is the author of Somniloquy & Trauma in the Knottseau Well, The Human Remains, Red Flag and Other Poems, Razed Monuments, Checking Tickets on Oumaumua, Sailing the Edge of Time, I Hear a Siren’s Call, Ghost Map, A Cacophony of Birds in the House of Dread, Tabletop Anxieties & Sweet Decay (with Tony Brewer) and short stories “The Tithing of Man” and “HEA-VEN2”. His poems appear in various journals and anthologies. He is the President of Midwest Writers Guild of Evansville, Indiana.

Reviews

[Breyaniah · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m not a big fan of poetry, but I enjoyed this one. I think what drew me in to this one more than others is that it’s more like a story, kind of like The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. And while I enjoyed the story aspect of it, I could also connect with the idea of feeling isolated and the uncertainty that goes with it, especially in 2020. I think Heerdink portrays the rollercoaster of emotions that is COVID, isolation, and loss well.

[Martin Stepek · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love the cover of this book, and the back cover too. Haunting and alluring in turn, which also describes the book and its theme.

This is The Odyssey as metaphor for Covid, for isolation, for temptation and giving in to temptation, or refraining.

It's lyrical and Biblical, sad and passionate, in waves, like the seas the narrator is on as he takes his life journey.

A pleasure to read; intriguing, challenging, and captivating.

[Jonathan Baker · Rating 5 out of 5]

I could smell the salt air and hear the gulls as I was guided across turbulent seas of loss and isolation to shores gleaning with desirable dangers.