Description

With beauty and sensitivity, this third collection of poems from Divakaruni, whose recent fiction includes The Mistress of Spices (Anchor, 1997), guides the reader through stories of immigration, changing traditions, and family violence. In "How I Became a Writer," a mother teaches her daughter to write. The tools are cement and chalk, and her mother is bruised, but her protective shadow "velvets the bare ground." From these nurturing scenes on a barren landscape, a writer is born. It is emblematic of Divakaruni’s work that she connects personal experience with cultural history in a soft but powerful voice. The section "Yuba City Poems," for instance, offers a glimpse into the hearts of immigrant men who learn that their wives in India may never rejoin them. Though she is part of a current wave of Indian writers, Divakaruni’s work bears closer comparison to poets like Sharon Olds. Parts of this work were awarded a Pushcart Prize and an Allen Ginsberg Prize. For all poetry collections.?Ann van Buren, New York Univ. Sch. of Continuing Ed.