In A Satisfactory Daughter, Jane Julius Honchell celebrates the legacy of family, the slow revolution of the seasons, and the sense of order she finds in structures of all kinds.
Like candid snapshots, the short poems in this collection create evocative images that bring all our senses into play. Jane confesses that words and their sounds obsess her, and her pleasure in their multiple possibilities is evident in every poem. True to her belief that laughter is our saving grace, she uses flashes of ironic humor as a counterpoint to her darker poems. Above all, like Linda Loman in Death of a Salesman, this poet insists that "attention must be paid," even to the seemingly insignificant, and invites the reader to share the sense of wonder and pleasure she finds in everyday life. |
|
In A Satisfactory Daughter, the precision of observation, the crispness of memory, the lush exaltation of language in this poet's exploration of our world and her life in it regularly startles, invigorates new meaning into the mundane. Jane Julius Honchell's endearing accounts of relationships in her life—as daughter, mother, wife, lover—all prove compelling, but the most irresistible relationship she describes is her affair with that "lovely hussy," her muse. From the "mother of invention" enticing us with curled finger in the collection's opening poem to the "logorrhea" of "maniacal tickle lemon verbena horsefeathers wimple" in "Out of the blue" to the sorrow and beauty of poems like "Memento mori," Honchell's love of language and image reveals a poignantly experienced, keenly felt life. What a joy to see through this poet's eyes!
—Amanda J. Bradley author of Queen Kong
"Live in wonder," the first words of this book proclaim, and that is what Jane Honchell's poems do, "drinking in everything" from family in all its complexity to food to the joys of language. Such a wealth of subjects, and such metaphorical richness!
—David Elliott, author of Through the Silence
A Satisfactory Daughter reminds readers to pause a moment to observe the beauty in the everyday, be it that moment when darkness transitions to light during the shadow hour, or the deliciousness of freshly baked bread. Honchell's attention to detail and ability to reconstruct memory will delight the reader from page to page.
—Brian Fanelli, author of Waiting for the Dead to Speak
|
