Customer Reviews

Fruits & Vegetables

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Erica takes the ordinary and makes it extraordinary in this her first book of her poetry. I am sick and tired of reading poetry in textbooks by dead white male windbags that have absolutely no relation to my life as a female.

Erica writes lovingly of the lowly Onion! "I am thinking of the onion again, with it's two O mouths, like the gaping holes in nobody. . . . " and it is pure ecstasy! I highly recommend this book to all poetry lovers. Also visite her website for even more inspriation: ericajong.com.

It's hard to find poetry like this that is at once both erotic and sensual while remaining highly opinionated. Erica proudly wears her belief that women are just as fragile as men and yet can be just as hard as men. In her hands, the word "feminist" becomes a finely edged tool that can reshape how we think of ourselves and our interaction with each other in relationships. She begins the book with a series of poems that compare different vegetables and fruits to the anatomy of men and women. The book then goes on to talk about a variety of subjects. In "His Silence" there's an undercurrent of sadness as she explores the idea of someone you love still controlled by events in thier past. In "With Silk" she talks about a lover as if he were a spectral agent instead of a man made of mere flesh.

Never afraid to show her displeasure with life and love or her sheer delight of it, Erica's work is provacative and a joy to read. She calls to mind such other poets as Pablo Neruda and Sylvia Plath, both of whom are excellent in their own right.

As a male I find her work refreshing and brutally honest and in a age where those qualities are looked down on I'm delighted that Erica has remained true to that inner voice.

Erica Jong's debute book of poetry is quite a fine collection of work. to be honest, i didn't realize a person could allude to so much with vegetables, especially onions.