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The National Poetry Review – Fall/Winter 2003

Issue 1

Fall/Winter 2003

Jeannine Hall Gailey

The debut issue of this attractive, glossy saddle-stitched review features poems by the likes of A.E. Stallings, Molly Peacock and Annie Finch. The National Poetry Review “favors formal verse” as demonstrated in these lyric lines by Ellen Kirvin Dudis from her poem “Betta Splendens”: “Love never offers. I see another, / not the other. Nights, I rise for air / -O lost lagoon, O submerged fire- / and on three inches of water / float these kisses. Your heart’s no larger than the jar.”

The debut issue of this attractive, glossy saddle-stitched review features poems by the likes of A.E. Stallings, Molly Peacock and Annie Finch. The National Poetry Review “favors formal verse” as demonstrated in these lyric lines by Ellen Kirvin Dudis from her poem “Betta Splendens”: “Love never offers. I see another, / not the other. Nights, I rise for air / -O lost lagoon, O submerged fire- / and on three inches of water / float these kisses. Your heart’s no larger than the jar.” And these lines in unrhymed iambic pentameter from Rachel Losh’s “For Our of Man this One was Taken”: “O Eve, O darting proton, fitful eyes / as green as bottle glass – your skin’s aswirl / with rivers so swift, the fleet sails down you first.” Themes of science and spirituality run through this issue, which consists solely of poetry – no reviews, fiction, or essays. The art on the cover, a print of a painting by Bruce Brezel entitled “Fall Poplars-Provence,” is as lovely as the poetry contained within the journal. I hope the issues that follow are as ambitious and self-contained as this one. [The National Poetry Review, PO Box 640625, San Jose, California 95164-0625. E-mail: [email protected]. Single issue: $6.00. http://www.nationalpoetryreview.com/] – JHG

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