Overview

The poems in this collection explore how grief builds through the weight of multiple losses, and then is at least partially dismantled through gratitude at being in the world. The poems explore not only the losses of friends and family, but also environmental shifts, changes in relationships, and the challenges of growing older. Finally, the collection builds to a letting go that offers a kind of peace.

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Reviews

Loved ones die, but they don't usually do it in rapid succession on the eve of a pandemic. After a while what can you do but shake your head in disbelief; witness these back-to-back titles: ""And Then Frank,"" ""And Another."" Nature, that universal provider of solace, isn't doing so well itself: the fog won't lift, the rains won't come, the concrete birdbath is shedding chunks of itself. Peterson's quiet narrator feels the wallop of grief every which way. She also honors each lost friend and relative with a short, blessedly unsentimental prose portrait, and then she picks herself up, and prevails. I will turn again to these crystalline poems with gratitude and pleasure whenever my own losses threaten to knock me down. -Michele Herman, author of Save the Village, Just Another Jack and Victory Boulevard THE SKY WEEPS WITH US, Laurel Peterson's latest book of poems, gently caresses its readers into a soft trance with carefully observed moments of simple beauty and quiet, everyday events. A squirrel, the fog, museums, artwork-all are delicately painted in quick, deft strokes that allow her readers to grab onto a perfectly phrased image. That description might make this book sound like a sweet little collection of verse, but it is anything but that. Peterson lulls us into that trance only to surprise us with a devastating punch to the face. Sometimes the punch feels thunderous and huge, while at other times it has the precision and sharp pain of an unexpected dagger. The mundane and mortal meet in these poems with the pandemic and deaths of loved ones always lurking in the background. At times, the delicate grief Peterson depicts is almost too painful to bear as she loses her father, worries about her husband's health, and contemplates her own aging and mortality. Perhaps her poems are best summed up by a line in ""Prayer"" ""even barrenness / shows her beauty / when caressed by beams."" The light Peterson shines on her scenes is not a blinding spotlight, but it is enough to give us necessary moments of simple grace in a world where grief is never ending. -Rick Magee, Poet Laureate of Bethel, author of&nb

Author Information

Laurel S. Peterson's poetry has been published in many literary journals. She has published two poetry chapbooks, as well as two full-length poetry collections, Do You Expect Your Art to Answer? and Daughter of Sky (Futurecycle Press) and two mystery novels, Shadow Notes and The Fallen (Woodhall Press). She is a writing professor, serves on the Norwalk Public Library Board, and was Norwalk, Connecticut's, Poet Laureate from April 2016-April 2019.

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