"The Soulwater Pool" by Claire Williamson (The Poetry Can, 2008)

Poems from a few PoVs - Gemma, her mother Ella (having an affair with Pete), Ella's mother Shona, and a policewoman Penelope/Penny. Ella's ex-husband, Nikos (Greek), disappeared when Ella left for a weekend in Paris. The dog's gone too.

"Ella: Paris - Hotel Room" is an initial info-dump thinly disguised by similes and line-breaks. Ella doesn't rhyme often regularly and uses words like "mundanity". She mentions Greek mythology a lot, dreaming about myths. Shona uses aaa rhyming - here's a sample -

Ella took to him as if he was divine; those photos in her bedroom made it look like a shrine. I told her how people show their true colours in time (p.47)

Gemma uses axa rhyming, Penny the policeman uses aa rhyming (though loosely - p.46 has shot/shop, detection/situations, gunman/van, hot/shot, muzzle/button, deceive/duty, after/counter, me/Poppy).

Ella writes (p.22) that "When I grew up, I could have moved town,/ travelled away, but Dad's absence/ made me stay". I think she was abused by her father. Ella nearly died giving birth to Gemma.

p.32 begins with "I give Ella Castoriadis a calling card and leave;/ in the street leaves are budding on the trees" - the "leave" repetition puzzles me. Penny takes a wounded ex-police dog with her when she works - her bosses tell her off about it. She might take some leave. So might Ella.

I struggle with parts like this -

After lying awake last night thinking of what to say, I told my boss that this would be my last day (p.57)

It sounds like doggerel - because Penny is under stress? But some later stanzas don't try to rhyme - is that too because of stress? Certainly the poem doesn't work as a stand-alone piece. Do any of them? I think the rhyming harms the book. Here's another stanza by Penny

Is it irresponsible to let her go in an emotional state? Since I met Ella I've let all protocol escape. (p.86)

Escape?

Nikos' body is found in the cellar with the dog, which is still alive. Ella says "He's in the cellar, throat-cut, dead./ It's Nikos, it's Nikos. I saw his head.". Surely she'd have said "I saw his face" - rhyme and dialogue struggle when together.

Ella finds his diary. He uses words like "incongruities" and quotes Dante. He was sad and she feels guilty. Maybe he didn't sleep with Leonie. In the diary Nikos writes that Shona told him that Ella's father abused her, but that Shona doesn't want Ella to know about her father's yearly visits to her.

But Shona wonders if perhaps she misinterpreted that scene long ago.

Ella's father comes to Nikos' funeral. Ella and Penny become friends, and their dogs do too. It ends with a dream by Ella where "I close my eyes to kiss Nikos's fragile blue lips;/ they taste of our shared lives,/ of belated forgiveness".

No.