Library Journal review of Road Scatter:
Meek, Sandra. Road Scatter. Persea Bks, dist. by Norton. 2012. c.96p. ISBN 9780892554195. pap. $15.95. POETRY
In her fourth collection, Meek presents dazzling, intricate poems about both the personal and the political. Many of the personal poems recall her parents’ last days, and how difficult it was to watch them suffer. The political ones cover war and the destruction of a mosque. The images in the latter poems are so beautiful that they provide a strong counterpoint to the horror she describes, “secondaries/only in breakage, scattered tesserae of glass/and tile--amethyst, peach, emerald what remains/of geometry ...” Unlike many of the others, the poem “Air Hunger” is very spare so it fits its topic well—“the body's last music.” While presenting the natural world, Meek’s language often darts to an emotional truth or a philosophical consideration. In some poems, because of the lushness of the language and cascading images (all deftly crafted), the reader can get lost in the poem and wonder where it's heading. Consider these fines from “Urban Warfare as Design”: “like bits of gold leaf/like jettisoned ant wings, minute insects born/into flight in summer streetlamps’ shining umbrellas ...” VERDICT Meek's poems are accomplished and interesting but not facile. Occasional poems are dense, but the collection as a whole is uplifting. For readers interested in poems that pinpoint the essential, that which makes us human, as in these lines from her first poem, “The body is a jar of air and lace;/the heart, a ruby beaker, a hummingbird sips/all summer from.”--Doris Lynch, Monroe Cty. P.L., Bloomington, IN
Source Citation (MLA 7th Edition)
Lynch, Doris. “Meek, Sandra. Road Scatter.” Library Journal 1
Oct. 2012: 82. General OneFile. Web. 6 Oct. 2012.
Document URL
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