ABOUT Suzanne Roberts
Suzanne Roberts was raised in Southern California and studied at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo and the University of Nevada, Reno. She is the author of another poetry collection, Shameless (Cherry Grove Collections). She teaches English at Lake Tahoe Community College in South Lake Tahoe, California. For more information, visit her website at http://www.suzanneroberts.org. Suzanne has recently been named "The Next Great Travel Writer" by Travcoa and The National Geographic Traveler (http://www.nationalgeographic.com/traveler/extras/essaycontestwinner0802.html).
And I am not sure if a link to "The Next Great Travel Writer" is appropriate, but if it is...
http://www.nationalgeographic.com/traveler/extras/essaycontestwinner0802.html
Nothing to You
by Suzanne Roberts
ISBN: 978-1-931247-46-7 $15
“Sensual and unabashed, Suzanne Roberts’ poems draw you into a world where “it isn’t enough to walk over/ the bridge. You must/ look under it, see how/wind distorts your reflection.” Roberts walks with you “in the space between dripping ferns,” takes you where “the leaving becomes/part of the other world, / of sleep, of dreams,” where “dawn unties/ the earth from sky.” Nothing to You is an arresting collection of poems where the poet’s gaze is unblinking even as she admits, “I should look away now, but don’t.”
—Sholeh Wolpé
author of The Scar Saloon and Rooftops of Tehran
“Suzanne Roberts weaves together restlessness, travel experiences and a healthy strand of suspicion, creating a tapestry both intriguing and mysterious. Often conversational with suggestive language, rife with images yet understated, Roberts’ poems promise adventures both physical and mental, grand and private, cloaked in an atmosphere of spoiled romance and esthetic longing.”
—Stephen Reichert
Editor, Smartish Pace
Crossing Paths
I don’t know if she worried about being a good mother.
At 19, she had twins, at 21 another boy came.
She was dark haired, beautiful. I am not my grandmother.
The youngest son drowned. The twins were at summer
camp in Fairhope when she boarded the plane.
I don’t know if she worried about being a good mother.
In 1930, she was on her way to Mexico to meet her lover,
but the small plane dove into a mountain range.
I don’t know if the body was retrieved. I’m not my grandmother.
The telegram sent to Daddy and his sister from their father
reads, Keep your courage and good spirits as your brave
mother would have wanted. Daddy thought her a good mother.
I am at the Art Institute in Chicago with my lover,
see Sorolla y Bastida’s Two Sisters, the painting
she’d copied. She was an artist. I am not my grandmother.
I breathe the sand and sea, the sisters and their shadows.
I take my lover’s arm, walk the charted path through wind
and rain, know for certain—her wish has found its way—
I am not my grandmother. I don’t have to be a mother.
Copyright © Pecan
Grove Press,
1997-2003
For further information contact
H. Palmer
Hall.
Web architecture by
Internet Navigating
Most recent revision
November 11, 2003
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |