ART SPIRITS, poems by (visual artist, science writer, and contemplative) Diane Solis, is an offering of poetic portraits of people, places, and animals as symbols and metaphors of the book's topics and themes, including courage, love, integrity, grief, healing, revealing, earth justice and social justice, hope, gender identification, devotion, strength, humor, transformation, and transcendence.
Section I, Working with What We Have. These poems stem from observations and/or the perspectives of artists and other workers, even nomadic animals in an Alaskan desert working towards a prize, wherein each subject needs and wants something as simple as a elderberries, as complex as empathy, respect, integrity, or friendship, and is doing the best they can with what they have to achieve or bestow it.
Section II, Sketches Near and Far. Through regional portrait poems spanning the U.S. and our neighbors to the north and south, as well as parts of the U.K. and Asia, honest and objective yet personal poems are centered on the aforementioned topics and themes and on some of the people, places, animals, issues, and flavors, of various regions.
Section III, Drawing from Inspiration. Here contemplative portraits offer an invitation to look and touch, to draw and be drawn from way beneath and beyond the surface of things. The consciousness of subject, writer, and reader may coalesce in greater awareness and deeper understanding of the subtle tones and colors of relevant themes, especially grief, courage, love, and their challenges, as well as the humor that can sustain us through the dark times.
Section IV, Gaining Perspective. Finally, there's a sense of "putting it together," understanding or accepting, interpreting and translating as an artist will, as poems do. This section is ART SPIRITS' final offering through portraits of being and becoming, perhaps transcending the experiences and challenges of life. Author and reader may contemplate them, be enriched and IN-formed by them, and move on, leaving behind some of the desert's bitter sweetness, and carrying it with us.
Industry Reviews
These poems by California poet Diane Solis glint with distinctive Western light. Like Larry Levis, Solis exhibits her breadth of skill with tightly compressed poems (“Thirst Like This,” “Tigers of Her Imagination”) as well as sprawling suburbanesque narratives (“Bennies,” “Dolphin Skeleton,” “Cigarettes”). Solis’ work pushes the reader past California’s chardonnay-tinged Romanticism to face the mirrored glare of the land “east of Eden.” Here, reminiscent of Frank Bidart, we find cancer, industrial accidents, county jails, bars, syringes, internment camps, and mange—all tucked among camellias, quail, chaparral, and peach trees. Solis makes a well-cultivated and rich contribution; she extends the open gesture embodied in California poetry.
–Rose Marie Berger, poetry editor, Sojourners magazine (www.sojo.net)
As usual, Diane Solis’ collection Art Spirits does not disappoint. Her lyrical descriptions and vivid characters embrace you and bring you home. A truly beautiful work of art!
–Michele Shaul, Professor, Department of World Languages, Director,
Center for Latino Studies, Queens University of Charlotte, Co-Editor of the
e-journal Label Me Latina/o
