"More than weeds" by L. Kiew (Nine Arches Press, 2023)

Poems from Bad Lilies, Poetry Salzburg, Rialto, Dark Horse, Under the Radar, etc.

On p.83 it says - "The page is an open fertile space in which to explore ... Poetry proliferates along the edges, whether of the raised bed of meaning or friable soil of sense ... I also believe that readers are curious and able to enjoy the sounds and shapes of words, to dig out meaning from context, and to explore using the many tools and resources are available online [sic].". I'm in favour of such advice from authors. But what happens when readers' curiosity ends in frustration?

"Tulips" is rectangular. To achieve that it uses spaces between words. The '|' character is used. Some lines have none of them, some 5 in a row. Often (12 out of 17 times) there's one at the end of a line. I'm puzzled. I don't know which of the many tools to use. Maybe they represent tulip stalks scattered in a rectangular flower bed. '|' means 'or' in some languages. Poets sometimes use it instead of a line-break. I don't enjoy its sound or shape.

The 2nd half of the lines of "Forest text" are in italics. Why?

The last stanza of "Corydalis lutea" is "When she has a wasp in her mouth/ she asks: can weed be just another/ name the rain calls down/ for refugee, unforced flower.". From context, "she" is the plant. The earlier verses fit with the description of the plant I've found online - it comes from S. Europe. "fumitory" is another name for it. In suitable conditions it can spread fast. Having looked that up, what of the final stanza? I know the phrase - "a weed is just a flower in the wrong place". Here the use of the word "refugee" is being compared to how "weed" is used? I don't get the rest of the stanza.

At times it turns into a "guess the plant" game. In "Red rearranged" the narrator wants red paint to be washed away. But there are "marks on a cheek, bloodstained teeth, nose rearranged ... His name was Rufus ... One day I'll forget I have lost anything". "Rufus" mean red, and it's a name of a flower, but is that relevant here? Doesn't look like it. But it's not much of a poem if Rufus is a battered person.

"Impatiens glandulifera" describes something/someone who arrived in 1839, spreading fast enouugh to irritate locals. "Migrant" is more of a riddle. Toads? "Learning to be mixi" is more interesting.

I don't know what "What has survived is the custom,/serving girls even pairs, adding strength to their futures" (p.36) means. I don't know what "Today it's cold and dark,/ the biscuits shop-bought. I eat them alone/ and anxious after the taste of sugar if I stop." (p.38) means.

If I'd gathered enough or help you a mermaid's purse lightly attached to weed maybe there would have been no cramping or tides bearing away the floating foam

on p.58 looks like the start of a miscarriage poem. It uses apostrophes but not commas or full stops. It's in triplets for some reason, the lines nearly all the same length. It uses upper case for first-person "I" but nowhere else. I can't work out the rationale. Why try to distract the reader?

I don't get "Pyllotaxis". Words are scattered on the page. Sections are numbers 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, 144, 233, 377 - house numbers where the plants are?

In "Vandals", "parakeets are sacking city trees .. they're feral flashbombs ... it's no wonder that magpie on its beat like a policeman with powers to stop and search calls them hooligans - says Send Then Back" sounds light. "When I said I wanted to be" sounds light too.

"To live here" ends with "Into the conflagation I flung/ myself, petals, language/ drifting from the page, not/ belonging, longing to live. Here."

"There's always spontaneous combustion" might be my favorite.