Intense imagery stings, startles, and soothes....

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	• More of Me Disappears John Amen Cross-Cultural Communications, 2005 - 76 pages average customer review:based on 4 reviews view larger image
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Every poem an adventure...

I've been a lover of John Amen's work for several years.

His poems never fail to take me with him on wonderful journeys sharing his magical visions.

John's poetry is a gift I give myself.

Exquisite--just exquisite!!

Intense imagery stings, startles, and soothes....

The brilliant contrasts found in John Amen's poetry are enhanced by his abilities as artist and musician. His words colorfully express the surreal and bitter, the heartwarming and expansive, all with a distinctive twist. Memorable lines stayed with me after this book had been set aside:
"this garden of wilted grace"
"the poison ivy of hollow hours"
"the ash and ember of our days"
"dogwood blossoms throb in the twilight"

Amen shares the joy of love, the sorrow of rejection. His use of imagery ranges from humorous to haunting to delightful:
Cicadas swarm like tourists; frogs
conspire behind every blade of grass.

The music of the iris is hard to withstand;
its purple song claws at my heart;

Amen fans are sure to relish this latest book. Poetry lovers unfamiliar with his work are in for an intense experience.

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Not much there

If readers expect to find a title poem in this collection of 44 poems, they will be disappointed: The title comes from one of the closing lines in "Vacillations."

"Leaves are quaking on the branch.
Each day more of me disappears"

There's not much humanity left in that "me" any more, apparently.

Frank and earthy

(Reviewed for VLQ by C. E. Laine)

I loved John Amen's first book, Christening the Dancer (Uccelli Press, 2003). His second collection, More of Me Disappears (Cross-Cultural Communications, 2005), is an engaging encore, building on a strong poetic voice. More of Me Disappears feels familiar, yet pushes in new directions. The poet's voice is varied within its pages, sometimes an intimate whisper, other times a sandy growl, or a shout at the cosmic injustice that sometimes swallows things whole.

In these poems, it is as though the reader holds hands with the poet, exploring observations, insights, and a deeply personal history together. Amen makes clear how one can study the same pattern or object in different lighting; he shows us how the shadows tend to shift. He puts on the coat of a storyteller, giving us narrative that doesn't leave its imagery behind. In poems like "Verboten", we glimpse something of Amen's history, intertwined with events that marked the world forever, as we see the effects of the Holocaust in the unique cast of Amen's light. In other narrative pieces, we see his parents, skirt around missing segments of memory, visit streets both seedy and beautiful.

Opening the collection with unassuming candor and a touch of suspense, Amen writes (The Consummation):

"Without warning,
the river runs dry, its spine
as glutted and songless as any morgue."

This poet doesn't just observe life. Clearly, he's in it, living hip deep, embracing whatever gets tossed his way: (In the Making) "My name is a boa. I am the canary writhing in its throat."

Amen shakes out the rugs we sweep things under, inspects what is found there. His awareness of sound is compelling, and his imagery often unexpected. A cool stream for a warm day, this collection is both gritty and tender. My favorite aspect of this book is its tenacity and its unadulterated sense of hope:

(What I Said To Myself)

Choose the butterfly over the chrysalis.
Choose light, the ballroom, the well-lit restaurant.

You have for lifetimes strummed minor chords
on the coast of a dead sea. Think major, spindrift.

The sex between you and grief is becoming mechanical.

Despite your vestigial sentiments to the contrary,
a scab's story is much greater than that of a scar.

Your cock is not an umbilical cord, it is your
heart's mouthpiece. Choose sunrise, please.

It is time to do something that might cause
embarrassment. Let emptiness mother your child.

Put away the map, where we're going won't be on it.

There is nothing particularly inspiring about a death wish.

You have learned all there is to learn from the woman in black.

It is time to stop insulting ecstasy. Masochism
is an empty udder. What was is a cipher. Pick
the rose over the injured dove. Pick warm waters.

Attend a circus. Go for the comic. There is nothing
more mediocre than the association of dysfunction with genius.

Indulge in color. Believe me, there is not a problem.
Plumb bright places for new symbols.

Recommendation: study evergreens.
Find me. We have much to talk about.

More of Me Disappears is a frank and earthy collection, one that embraces life with the lights on, unashamed of whatever the mirror decides to reflect. Like it's predecessor, it is a book I am sure to revisit often.

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