One Crimson Thread - Softcover

O'Siadhail, Micheal

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1481307800 ISBN 13: 9781481307802

Publisher: Baylor University Press, 2017

Synopsis

For twenty years, celebrated poet Micheal O’Siadhail’s beloved wife, Bríd, suffered from Parkinson’s disease. O’Siadhail’s verses explore the ordinary triumph of human fidelity and sound the depths of parting through a 150-sonnet sequence in which love faces wasting illness and the specter of death. There is tenderness, intensity, and gratitude―which will resonate with all who know both love and loss.

About this title

About the Author:

Micheal O’Siadhail is an internationally acclaimed poet whose Collected Poems, gathering together thirteen collections, was published in 2015. Married for forty-three years, he chronicles in One Crimson Thread the last two years of his wife’s life, her death, and his grief. He now lives and works in New York City.

Review:

"I read slowly, carefully, and with deep emotion One Crimson Thread. It's a beautiful, beautiful but terribly sad poem of love."―Jean Vanier, reviewing a previous edition or volume

"This is poetry that is deeply human and accessible, beautifully observed, honest and technically controlled."―Francis Phillips, Catholic Herald, reviewing a previous edition or volume

"Micheal O'Siadhail is one of Ireland's finest poetsbut his latest collection of poems is perhaps his most personal and affecting yet."―Miriam O'Callaghan, RTÉ (Ireland's national radio station), reviewing a previous edition or volume

"O'Siadhail seems to rise to a new intensity of writing and analysis in this collection. This is both a searing and a beautiful interrogation . . . it offers immense compassion and consolation."―Martyn Halsall, Church Times, reviewing a previous edition or volume

"One of the most emotionally compelling books of poetry I've read in a long time, the sequence chronicles the final two years of a forty-year marriage, as the poet's beloved wife . . . The privilege of witnessing the hard but redemptive reality this couple had to face is one of the great gifts this remarkable book provides."―David M. Katz, The Hopkins Review, reviewing a previous edition or volume

"One Crimson Thread, a beautiful, tender and heartbreaking series of poems that chronicle the last two years of Bríd's life, her death and his grief."―Andrea Smith, Sunday Independent, reviewing a previous edition or volume

"It is the biography of a marriage and one of the most elegant pictures of faithfulness that I have ever encountered in all my years of readingThis is an extraordinary collection; a portrait of love and of a poet's immortal faithfulness."―Thomas McCarthy, The Irish Examiner, reviewing a previous edition or volume

"The images conjured by the poet are so vivid that I feel I have been to the place where she lives for the few months before she diesI think those who have loved ones who have Parkinson's disease would learn more from reading this poem than reading swathes of medical literature, and likewise professionals can only benefit from the emotional understanding gained from reading and re-reading this poem."―Teresa Black, Journal of Geriatric Care and Research, reviewing a previous edition or volume

"One Crimson Thread is a compelling, intimate, and memorable body of heartfelt poetry."―The Poetry Shelf, Midwest Book Review, reviewing a previous edition or volume

About this edition

• Publisher: Baylor University Press
• Publication date: 2017
• ISBN 10: 1481307800
• ISBN 13: 9781481307802
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 164