The Sorrowing House

Genevieve Lehr's debut poetry collection is astonishing in its stylistic range, employing the lyric, prose poem, folk song and fable, as well as several long poems, in her attempt to understand the complexities of human life. The Sorrowing House focuses on her difficulties as a single mother with three children, including a son with special needs. The poems range far and wide in search of metaphors adequate to elucidate the stark contrast between the joys and sorrows of a life constrained by harrowing limitations and challenges. In March the river rises. On its bank the thin bodies of birch reach up, herons stretching a paper-maker's wife pounding reeds in the wind. from "river images for my son" Lehr's work is haunting. She is deft in her ability to move from the small, intimate details of a life, to universal issues of human existence: the immutability of pain, the limits of love, the consolation of song and music, the solace of intimacy. The Sorrowing House is symphonic in scale, giving us beautiful lyric solos while drawing together its larger themes in an overarching sweep from the first page to the last. A book to read and reread. "This new voice in Canadian poetry is veined with fierce insight and a lyrical sense of direction. Each poem takes us to the depths of its truths and stays lit long after being read." --Sue Goyette