Words and
Music Riffs
By Shelby Stephenson
Hiram Larew turns loose the syllables like steam on water in his 2021 book, Mud Ajar, from Atmosphere Press. His words do not sink up in stirred up mud. At times I feel as if I can almost see through the mud, as the poet shakes form and content to create Poetry.
In “Quiet Come” —
All is up
yes
all is sky
In “Ode to the Edge” —
all arrows lift their grateful views
sung-up like curves
the call of bogs
where edge surrounds
Listen to these few lines from “Mud Ajar,”
the title poem —
Here where beaks are barns
that loop through when
as rain lifts praise
on trill of rakes.
In “Listened Twigs” listen to Larew’s lines —
These trees a choir
in early fine
their waking limbs
When snowflakes hear within themselves
of how beginning sounds.
Every syllable sings: example, these words from “Sign a Lease” —
When the skies boil or bloom
go sweep the stoop. PS
Hiram Larew is the founder of Poetry X Hunger which inspires writers all over the world to combat hunger. In Mud Ajar, the music quakes and the sky blazes all over again.
Shelby Stephenson was poet laureate of North Carolina from 2015-18. His recent book is Praises from Main Street Rag Publishing Company.
