Poetry is hard to review, because different types of poets have different objectives in their writing. With my theatre background, I come to poetry from a performance point of view. I gather Ms. Wu comes from a more academic background. There are  bound to be disagreements.

For example, there is a cute bit of visual poetry that goes like this:

“Don’t need no grammar to say my mind.

Dont need punctuation to prove a point”

I love the graphic manner of the demonstration, but I disagree with the opinion.

The moment you put pen to paper, punctuation and grammar become a factor to consider. You either use them in the traditional sense as aids to communication, or you reject them as restrictive and stifling of creativity. Either opinion is valid, but I suggest you shouldn’t try to create your own version of them. By doing so you acknowledge their power but use them to deny communication, because we spend our time trying to decipher the medium, and are distracted from the message.

So, some of these poems are missing a sense of flow and continuity. Use (for example) of multiple parentheses (for an unknown reason) breaks up the flow of the read and also distracts (by introducing a red herring) from our concentration on the ideas.

I much prefer works like “A Thousand Moments.” Four solid lines of poetic imagery following a logical pattern where each line carries the idea another step through a recognizable pattern to a solid conclusion.

“The Rain Is Not Simply Rain” is another free verse poem with a nice emotional flow, with poetic imagery and other techniques that enhance the theme.

But why is “To” capitalized? All is does is distract me from the thought I am following. Despite this minor cavil, the poem left me with a satisfied feeling.

Another positive I note is that some of these poems, like “Summertime Meander” and especially “Dust for the Lonely,” are meant to be spoken aloud, flowing with the cadence of normal speech. Others, like “Star-Eyed Thoughts,” do not fare so well.

As you can see, this book covers a variety of styles of poetry, showing the poet’s range and technique. I feel it would benefit from more emotional content. In my world, poetry should make us feel first, think later.

Four stars