WINTER POEMS
William Michaelian
Cosmopsis Books 2007
San Francisco, California
ISBN 978-0-9796599-0-4
$11.95
Michaelian’s metaphors sting like walking in snow too
long, “I’m an old man alone with a frozen axe, a
curved wooden handle planted in dead weight.” He
presents winter in stark reality; the hunger, the
piling snow, the impending situations only nature
seems to recognize and the poet takes heed.
“howling-gruff the call-forth bark
of scent-wise remembering dogs,
tether-worn with pale claws,
madness revived in distance born,
I run off to greet the storm.”
Have we lost our ability to discern the signs or to
except the storm? perhaps. William Michaelian is very
capable of reading the season’s turn.
“not a single leaf remains:
a reminder that winter kills,
while that which survives
is cleansed.”
As a city dweller I welcome these poems. This honest
straight forward book, like a warm fire glows, and has
embers. Michaelians' madness is about what is happening
around him. It is not the madness of a saint or a
sinner, it is the madness of knowing.
“shall
we confirm
what others fear
to know? that a plaster
statue lives long
after winter
has set
in?”
Irene Koronas
poetry editor: wilderness house literary review
submissions editor: ibbetson street press
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