$13.99
The Wind Unwinds explores family relationships, those of a daughter’s to her dead father but mainly to her elderly mother. Memories stir the poet’s imagination till the poems come, with expressions from tender intimacy to beleaguered irritation, or as the author writes at one point, “My smile/ fell off/ in December.” The clear imagery and strong rhythms in these poems will surprise and reward a reader.
–Shelley Reece, poet, and professor of English at Portland State University for 30 years. He chaired the Friends of William Stafford from 2005 to 2010.
At the center of Barbara Arzt’s moving collection is a series of poems about caring for her aging mother. These poems are tender-hearted and at the same time unflinchingly honest about the difficult emotions that come with such care. Of the disorientation both she and her mother feel, Arzt writes: “Wind, delirious, wraps the house / and turns it upside down. / Day is night and / night is day / and my mother sees devils / dance on the ceiling.” Both mother and daughter were professional dancers, and images of dancing appear throughout the book. More importantly, Arzt brings a dancer’s grace and lightness of touch to one’s of life’s most difficult chapters. The Wind Unwinds is a wise and generous book.
–John Brehm, author of Help Is on the Way
The Wind Unwinds
by Barbara Arzt
$13.99, paper
978-1-63534-895-8
2019
Barbara grew up in the Pacific Northwest. Her first memories are of clear streams, trillium, and tall fir. A career in dance took her far from these childhood images but her love for Oregon was never diminished. Barbara is a poet, and a calligrapher who also enjoys gardening, cooking, and choral singing. She lives in Portland in the village of Multnomah with her husband and mother of 97 years.
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