Send The Raven Poems

In this selection of new poetry, Susan Blanshard's poems, distilled drop by drop into a hundred and forty-seven poems, pulse together in the same living bloodstream.

The closer one looks at a word, the elements and symbols of poetic catharsis unriddle meanings from the barest fragments. With Blanshard's share of the world outside the door, like an eavesdropper, by happenstance and default, chance or choice, the walls paper thin, even as much as a single dry twig in the garden, snaps…she listens. Send the Raven is the inward grace. Major events that disrupted the seasons, paradoxically, find poignant shelter in Blanshard's poetry.

Here, acknowledgement of the human spirit is evident, not separable, from her writing. Words find shelter in the shift between techniques. Susan brings a variety of past worlds to life by reversing and elaborating traditional stanzas and bringing soothsaying echoes of historic form to light. As with previous works, epic book-length prose of Sheetstone', Honey In The Blood, and the poetry of Fragments of The Human Heart', Quieter Histories,  Blanshard connects epochs of time with subtlety, elegance, imagination, emotional attitude, and notable sensuality. 'Send The Raven' is a continuum of the dialogue with past and present histories, what is inherited, possessed and dispossessed; what is remembered and what is known. A passionate conversation that exists at the center of her poetry.

Susan Blanshard was born in Hampshire, England. She is a poet, essayist, poetry transaltion editor and author of fiction and non-fiction. Susan experienced a nomadic childhood. Consequently, her literary work is colored by her multicultural past and present. Susan Blanshard has re-translated Asian poems into English poetical form. She was the contributing Revisionary English Poet for sixteen books and works of poetry, essay, critique, for the recipient of the Swedish Cikada prize for Asian poets.