Feverfew (Anna Saunders)
Indigo Dreams Publishing 2021
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Feverfew is an impressive book that sings with precision.
Saunders is clearly gripped by the environment and the world around us. Her use of imagery reminds me of the kind of language used by Philip Gross in his A Bright Acoustic collection. The following words are featured in the Feverfew’s Time after Time the Same Bird is Born from the Flame:
Not even death will bring an end to this
The purpled bird stains the air
like dye bleeding through cotton.
So, light and wonder are visible threads that emerge in this collection. I am a poet-chemist so was thrilled to see these words. This snippet brings to my mind the discovery of mauveine, the purple material known as Perkin’s mauve.
Another notable example from Saunders is this couplet from her poem A Memory of Two Creatures Colliding:
The pint tree is full of goldfinches, their metallic chatter
a teasing squabble. There is a dove, fluttering to a settle.
Later, the same poem features these lines:
There’s a fury of pearl and platinum,
a flourish of wings like skirts billowing up.
These descriptions teased my interest in science, and the use of a chemical element and material works so well. Integration of the atomic, or molecular, into poetry has developed at pace in recent times. So, these poems also sit within the orbit of writers such as Mario Petrucci and Sarah Watkinson (who also explore the overlaps between poetry and science).
Some poems in Feverfew straddle mythological and dark themes, so, if you like reading Ted Hughes and other writers who explore the macabre, then there might be something for you. The more meek-hearted may struggle with the vulgar tone in a poem about intimate ghosts and the book’s infernal themes at times. I would put myself in this bracket (I am a bit sensitive). Regardless of your position, you will still be drawn to the author’s arrangements of words on the page.
An example of the book’s imagery is shown in Is this the ebb, or flow? Here, Saunders opens with ‘We are manacled in green.’ The mental pictures conjured by her writing often linger long after reading the pages of Feverfew. The Delusion of glass is a strong, compelling poem. I encourage you to read it. Here is an extract:
At first, imagine how beautiful – your glaze
refracting light, all your tempests sealed like storms,
in a paperweight, and feeling the rain run off you.
These words made me think of Roald Hoffmann and Michael Symmons Roberts, other practitioners of embedding scientific themes within poetry. Yet, Feverfew has a uniqueness of its own. A kaleidoscopic voice is speaking here that pushes your imagination into unfamiliar places.
Stephen Paul Wren (October 2024)
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