In the Eye of the Storm

By Linda Talbot

"In the Eye of the Storm" is a collection of verse in three sections. "Demeter's Dance" conveys mysterious or disquieting aspects of nature. In the poem "To Marcus by the Corn", the past one can feel locked beneath the earth of a Suffolk field, seems, momentarily, to uncannily possess the boy walking through the field with the poet.
Demeter was the guardian goddess of the land which she let wither while searching for Persephone, her daughter, abducted by Hades and carried to the Underworld. The poem "Demeter" recalls her as a ghost, still wandering the fields and waiting to return. And in "Moon Hare" there is a recollection of the folk belief that a girl left by her lover turned into a white hare!
In the section "Breakages", the experience of loss and regret is rife in such poems as "The Dream", conveying the unreachable, in "In Retrospect", comparing a lost love to "dark music in reluctant depths without expression", while turmoil and compassion surface in "The Final Piece", where the element that would complete a person's character, has gone astray.
Youthful pessimism persists in "Drowned", bemoaning the loss of our universal soul and "The Butterflies" have but a fleeting beauty.
The collection "Moonbirds and Wild Water" is inspired by Greece and her islands - from the birds that sang all night in Skiathos and thoughts on Santorini's volcano, to verse about Crete where I live - from the resilience of her mountain folk to the myth of the Minotaur in the Knossos labyrinth.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Linda Talbot
• Release date: Mar 10, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301393848

Linda Talbot

Linda Talbot has written fantasy for children and adults and for many years reviewed art, theatre and books in London. She now lives in Crete. She published "Fantasy Book of Food"; rhymes, stories and recipes for children and "Five Rides by a River" - about Suffolk, seen from a bicycle! She contributed a chapter to a book about Conroy Maddox, the British surrealist and features on art to "Topos" the German landscape magazine. She published short stories with the British Fantasy Society as well as stories and poetry in other magazines. And she launched "Wordweavers", an online supplement of poetry and fiction, published in conjunction with The Cretan International Community.

Book preview

In the Eye of the Storm

~~~~ Three Collections of Poems ~~~~

Linda Talbot

Smashwords Edition

Copyright Linda Talbot 2013

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Contact blog: http://lindajtalbot.wordpress.com

~~~~~Table of Contents~~~~~

Introduction

Demeter's Dance [collection of 13 poems]

Breakages [collection of 24 poems]

Moonbirds and Wild Water [10 poems from Greece]

Two Final Poems

Author's Note

Introduction

Within turmoil, distress and the poignancy of place, lies the motionless eye of the storm with perspectives of insight and occasional calm.

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Demeter's Dance

TO MARCUS BY THE CORN

The boy paused by the corn. Half comprehending,

in the low wind listening. A liaison with the land.

He stood where boys before had paused, and sensed

the corn lands’ primal source,