'Recording Emotions and Moods'

“A poem records emotions and moods that lie beyond normal language, that can only be patched together and hinted at metaphorically.” – Diane Ackerman

Born in Illinois on Oct. 7, 1948, Ackerman writes poetry, nonfiction and children’s books and is the winner of numerous awards in all three genres.  In 2015, her book The Human Age won the National Outdoor Book Award and New England's Henry David Thoreau Prize for nature writing.   She’s also been a finalist for both a Pulitzer Prize and a National Book Critics Circle Award for One Hundred Names for Love.

 

Usually I have a poem from the featured poet on Saturday, but Ackerman’s work is not available for reprint, so instead, I close this look at my selection with one more quote, to show a bit of her writing style.

 

”Nothing is more memorable than a smell. One scent can be unexpected, momentary and fleeting, yet conjure up a childhood summer beside a lake in the mountains; another, a moonlit beach; a third, a family dinner of pot roast and sweet potatoes during a myrtle-mad August in a Midwestern town. Smells detonate softly in our memory like poignant land mines hidden under the weedy mass of years. Hit a tripwire of smell and memories explode all at once. A complex vision leaps out of the undergrowth.”

 

           

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