Small Wonders by James Keane

With brevity and musicality, the poems in Small Wonders make peace with the world. I recommend reading them through once and then rereading them often, as they act as a form of meditation. James Keane expresses his vulnerability and love in poems dedicated to his wife and son and also to inhabitants of the larger world, the victims of terrorist attacks, and to George Floyd. About a grandfather’s company, he writes: “we managed our way / together down the long, slow streets / of your frailty. Then gradually, very / gradually, back the way we came.” In other poems, he deftly observes the tension of a couple hiking to a waterfall: “we groped // until there was / nothing / to say, nothing / to do, but // listen / to the water.” At seeing a child’s coffin, he asks of the grieving mother: “Did you ever / know laughter, the respite / it can bring; smile with patience / at children, / or anyone / imploring you to / sing.” He ends the collection with a prayer for understanding, “through / all the beautiful shades / of our humanity / and the passion / we all share / for living.” There is a reverence to these poems that presents them as “small wonders,” but they resonate in very ample ways.

–Ellen Foos, author of The Remaining Ingredients

Like James Keane’s powerful and touching debut collection, What Comes Next, his new volume, Small Wonders, upholds language’s power to move intensely and capture experience precisely. Deeply grounded in the everyday, these engaging and resonant poems reveal the connections between the world and the other-worldly with precision and heart. In “When I was Very, Very Young,” a patient grandfather manages to keep up with a babbling, bouncing child who observes, many years later, that Never once/did you disrupt the joy/propelling me. Pieces I admire particularly, “Thank You for Being My Son,” “Facebook Photo” and “A Woman’s Face,” are exquisite examples of Jim’s recurring themes of gratitude and the capacity to love, and show us how reverence and humor can grow from a common source. The book you hold in your hands contains, in abundance, the surprising and often uplifting words of a passionate and insightful storyteller.

–Catherine Doty, author of Wonderama and Momentum