NEW YORK:
IF RECEPTION to the recent launch of her book of poems in Washington is any indication, Jamaican poet Sharmaine Allen's volume, 'Turning Mourning Into Dancing - The Journey Of A Soul', will surely afford her voice a place among poets who speak with a strong moral voice.
Drawing on observations which she jotted down over 20 years, this poetic work takes us on a journey that involves sometimes deeply personal issues. The poetic volume also demonstrates a passion for not only spiritual, but social justice and humanitarian concerns and these turn up in entries that take a look at homelessness, among other touching scenarios. At the Washington D.C. launch of the book, Allen's offerings were made to leap off the pages and take the already enrapt audience on a journey of some hard, cold realities.
The launch was dramatised in four acts comprising 22 of the poems, neatly arranged in thematic correlation: True Freedom; Bridge Builder; A Broken Love Story and The Journey. In the book, the poems are under three main themes Rhythm of the Heart, Rhythm of the Spirit and A Response to Rhythm. But the way in which the poems are strung together, they speak with one voice carrying a simple message about struggle, truth, love, responsibility, family and faith. By the time we get to the concluding segment of the volume, we hear a more philosophical, existential voice which no longer dwells on the perplexities.
We are also presented with a recurring theme of reconciliation, even in how the inner turmoil, the emotions and the questions are all resolved in simple unvarnished declarations about the power of bridging the divide-reconciling our minds to the bothersome emotions floating around in our heads.
'Turning Mourning Into Dancing' is a delightful little book of short poems. It is published by Biographical Publishing Company, based in Prospect, Connecticut.
