Lori D. Roadhouse reviews Debra Black’s “love, lust, existence and other ephemeral things”

I read these poems first in order, then backwards, and also randomly. Each poem exists on its own merit, as a breath in time. The breaths come faster, or more slowly, depending on the subject matter, and depending on the order in which they are read. It’s almost a meditation, a rocking chair, representing the rhythms of life.

This, in the middle of a love poem, as the subject imagines making love with both Pablo Neruda and her real lover, Death. The poem begins with caresses of tender words, rises to a quickening and climax, then resolves back into wistful tenderness. Languid, gentle breaths in nature morph into panting, lusty inhalations of sexual fantasy and physical exertions. The ever-changing tidal motion in this book is at times comforting, at other times perplexing, often very sensual and unapologetically sexual.

Black’s book takes us around her world, imaginary or experienced, from the turquoise waters of Greece, to Boticelli’s Italy, to the mystery of the Hotel Brazil in Paris. Blue chutes of water, azure and turquoise scenes – it is apt that the book’s lovely cover design, by Michèle Guevara, is blue on blue.

Between the ephemeral blues of water and sky there is substance, of tangible and lived experience. This summary of a woman’s life takes place on solid ground, yet she allows herself to escape into fantasy, memory and desire.

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Lori D. Roadhouse is a Calgary poet, writer, aphorist and singer.  She has been a member and supporter of the Writers’ Guild of Alberta, the Alexandra Writers’ Centre Society, the Red Mile Revenge poets, Passion Pitch Poetry and the Magpie Haiku Poets. She co-created the 2003 Writing Toward the Light Poetry Contest/Poetry Concert.Since 2007, Lori has been a Board member of the Single Onions Poetry Series. From 2008 – 2010 she was co-artistic director, performer and MC of Lotus Land at South Country Fair.She was the 2009 Poet in Residence for Radiant Lights eMagazine. She is a featured reader at a number of poetry and spoken word events and radio programs. She has been published in a  variety of anthologies, magazines, newsletters, websites and CDs. Her recent publications include: Tap Press Read by the Calgary Public Library and Loft 112; POP YYC, the project of Calgary’s recent Poet Laureate, Sheri-D Wilson; The Time of the Poet Republic, curated by Darcie Friesen Hossack and envisioned by Mbizo Chirasha; and (M)othering Anthology, published by Inanna Publications in 2021.

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