Slate Petals

by Anthony Etherin

Through a series of forms both old and new, Anthony Etherin explores the range of poetic formalism, from its simplest structures to its most complex — thereby following the path from lucid, lyrical scenes that learn to breathe despite their binds, to geometric ideals that tease the breaking point of meaning.

148 pages, Hardcover

Published July 10, 2021

About the author

Anthony Etherin is a writer of experimental formal poetry.

He frequently tweets short palindromic, anagrammatic and formal poetry @Anthony_Etherin.

Anthony's poetry uses both traditional forms and strict lettristic constraints, sometimes simultaneously. Included in his oeuvre are palindromic and anagrammatic sonnets, anagrammed palindromes (two or more palindromes that are anagrams of each other) and 'aelindromes', a letter-based constraint of Anthony's own invention.

His chapbooks are Cellar (Penteract Press, 2018), Danse Macabre (above/ground press, 2018), Quartets (Penteract Press, 2019), Otherworld (No Press, 2019), and Thaumaturgy (above/ground press, 2020).

His full-length collection “Stray Arts (and Other Inventions)” was published by Penteract Press in October 2019.

Reviews

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

I haven’t been reading poetry for very long so each book that I pick up from all manner of poets is a discovery of what is possible. A lot of the poems that I have read this year have varied from the classics like Heaney to more up to date material from contemporary poets. For me the joy of poetry is the way that the author can extract the most amount of meaning from the fewest words; I try to read each poem as it stands too rather than having to extract the meaning from every word.

They have all followed similar patterns too, but then I picked up Slate Petals. This is unlike any other poetry collection that I have read before. There are poems that are images, I Leave Torn is a series of images of torn letters rearranged into a neat shape, Marionette Noir a.m. is a musical notation and Noir of Orion is the constellations arranged in a series of different forms.

There are regular forms and stanzas too, but Etherin uses form, structure and layout in a quite unique way, for example, those that have been typeset to mimic the subject matter of the poem. I particularly liked the poems within poems that used subtly different font colours. If you want a poetry collection that will challenge everything that you thought possible this is a good place to start.

Three Favourite Poems
Winter Solstice
Early Sun
Oblivion

[Angela · Rating 4 out of 5]

Slate Petals and Other Wordscapes is an eclectic collection of verse in both traditional and experimental forms, divided into sections which the author defines as: “forms of nature and forms of thought: external and internal landscapes.”
In Landscapes, we travel from the dryness of The Deserts to the lusher lyricism of The Dales and feel the frosty breath of the Winter Solstice, before alighting on The Woods are Deep, symmetrical patterns formed from a photograph of a woodland scene. Seascapes is illustrated by Asemic Tales of a Coastal Slate - an image of a piece of Welsh slate, highlighting the effects of coastal erosion. The moon and stars feature prominently in Skyscapes. Early, misty moon is one outstanding example of a poem in which all the lines are anagrams of each other:

“Early, misty moon
My solitary omen
My rain looms, yet
It’s only a memory…”

Mindscapes includes an abbreviated version of The Raven, reducing Edgar Allan Poe’s lengthy poem from 18 stanzas to three. Showcasing the poet’s wide-ranging portfolio of skills, there is even a musical composition entitled Marionette Noir a.m.
Lorescapes conjures up myths and legends about banshees, vampires, phantoms and Kelpies – shape-shifting spirits found in Irish and Scottish folklore. Then there is the curious case of The Green Children of Woolpit, a medieval tale about two children who had green skin and ate nothing but broad beans. Were they perhaps distant relatives of Shrek? (Or at least, an early example of myths about green-skinned beings.)
Endscapes deals with death and disintegration. In Deathscape, the words fade away until they almost disappear, while I Leave Torn is an image of torn fragments of Egyptian papyri rearranged like a jigsaw puzzle. End of Days II is an apocalyptic scenario in five lines of anagrammed verse:

The world was ending:
Dawn light worsened.
Nights wandered low.
The long wind was red
With drowned angels….

Anagrams and palindromes, which are part and parcel of Etherin’s trademark style, are incorporated in many of the poems. The concluding section, Formscapes, outlines the different poetic constraints used in the collection, including the aelindrome, a form of his own devising, which uses groups of letters “parsed according to underlying numerical palindromes.”
If that sounds complicated to you, it might at least give you some insight into the complex workings of this poet’s maverick mind.

Slate Petals is published by Penteract Press
https://penteractpress.com/store