Terra Infirma, Poems by Carol Westberg

The fine lyric poems in Terra Infirma traverse interior and exterior spaces-- from grief to joy, from Tuscany to Orkney to "the changed place we call home." We cannot know which plates will shift under our feet, says poet Carol Westberg, "Whatever has been taken from us, whatever comes next...."

Sample Poems by Carol Westberg

"Age, illness, accident--the trials and truths of our temporal bodies, of our journeys between heaven and earth. Mature readers will immediately recognize and embrace this terrain, but find it freshly imagined and recounted. These unabashedly musical, deeply felt poems are wise enough to embrace sorrow, but remain, as Westberg insists, 'fierce to live.'" -- Mark Cox

"Who or what does the mourner become in Time? What does grief do to time? These are not new questions, but in Terra Infirma they receive tender, ruthless, provocative attention. 'What would you like to do today, / nothing?' the poet asks, and 'Is that nothing like a monk / or nothing like a woman who lost / her job and watches prime time all day?' By turns oneiric, personal, peripatetic, and ekphrastic, the poems interrogate even the power of poetry, travel/travail, art, and music to redeem the 'merciless tests' of illness, accident, and loss. Each poem in Westberg's new book travels with lyric clarity this turf of illuminated scars." -- Lisa Russ Spaar

"In this bittersweet collection, Carol Westberg's poems of grief and loss continue to remind us how deeply our lives may be cherished, here on this Terra Infirma. There is a tenderness in these poems and a hard-won acceptance of the stakes of mortal love." -- Cynthia Huntington

Carol Westberg’s first book of poems, Slipstream, was a finalist for the 2011 New Hampshire Literary Award for Outstanding Book of Poetry, and "Map of Uncertain Soundings," within that collection, was a finalist for the Ruth Stone Prize. Born in Berkeley, California, Carol grew up on a farm in Iowa and earned degrees from Duke, Stanford, and Vermont College. She’s worked as a teacher, writer, editor, and communications consultant. The parent of two grown daughters, she lives with her husband in Hanover, New Hampshire.

ISBN: 978-1625491336, 90 pages

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