Small Knots [Paperback]

Kelli Russell Agodon (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 1, 2004

Small Knots is a tender and terrifying collection of poems that maps the development of breast cancer, celebrates the family and life’s daily small joys, and meditates on what connects us to the world.

Editorial Reviews

Review

These are necessary, exacting poems that render me stunned and happily spent—grateful for the blossom and burst on each page. -- Aimee Nezhukumatathil, author of Miracle Fruit (Tupelo Press)

These delightful, accessible poems are unafraid of exploring some of life’s more perilous regions... and always with clarity, humor... -- Peter Pereira, author of Saying the World (Copper Canyon Press)

About the Author

Kelli Russell Agodon was born and raised in the Seattle area and educated at the University of Washington. She is also the author of Geography, winner of the 2003 Floating Bridge Press Chapbook Award.

Product Details

• Paperback: 88 pages
• Publisher: WordTech Communications (June 1, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1932339272
• ISBN-13: 978-1932339277
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.3 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #908,836 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Kelli Russell Agodon's second collection Letters from the Emily Dickinson Room (winner of the White Pine Press Poetry Prize) was chosen by ForeWord Magazine's Book of the Year in Poetry and was a Finalist in the Washington State Book of the Year Awards.

Kelli was born and raised in Seattle and educated at the University of Washington and Pacific Lutheran University's Rainier Writing Workshop where she received her MFA in creative writing.

She is also the author of Small Knots (2004) and Geography, winner of the Floating Bridge Press Chapbook Award. Currently, Kelli lives in the Northwest with her family. She is the editor of the literary journal, Crab Creek Review and the co-founder of Two Sylvias Press. Visit her webpage at: www.agodon.com or stay in touch with her on Facebook: www.facebook.com/agodon

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Heartbreaking, lovely, July 16, 2004

By 

Jeannine Hall Gailey (Pacific Northwest) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Small Knots (Paperback)

Agodon's first book deals with the tangles that loss brings to a life - the loss of love, the loss of health, the loss of loved ones - as well as the philosophical musings of a well-read mind about the connections we make in life with writers, places, even objects. The writing is well-paced and lyrical, with humorous and heartbreaking twists. Her word choices and images are always apt. Favorite poems of mine include "Sailing Lepidoptera" and "After My Last Chemo Appointment, I Steal Page Six from The Children's Illustrated Book of Bible Stories." Here are some lines from "Pablo Neruda Lemons," a particularly sensual poem: "Some say you will fall/ in love after sucking them/dry,//that if you cut through/ their center, the sea will/ open in your veins.//Believe me when I say they are/ the tips of flame/ you undress in front of...You will want to be in the hands that peel them,/ to disappear/ in this stranger's skin."
Enjoy this book!

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A lively first collection, December 3, 2004

By 

reader - See all my reviews

This review is from: Small Knots (Paperback)

Agodon's first collection is as lively as its stunning cover promises. The 50 poems are neatly divided into three thematic sections, each spotlighting a different chapter of a woman's life: family matters, romance, the betrayals of the body. These sections are tightly and cleverly held together by a sewing motif which weaves its way throughout the poems. The reader will find much humor here as well as bold confrontations with family secrets and breast cancer. The reader will also find sensuous imagery and imaginative metaphors, as in these lines from "Living Room Explorers":

Let me slip off my boot of Italy, my sweater
of Zimbabwe and map the dining room table,
the chairs, the matching ocean-colored plates.

We're a number on the earth: latitude wine,
longitude bread and trying
to become our own island.

Agodon writes in free verse but with a formal elegance in this collection which records both the delights and the shadows of a woman's life.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Maps to ashes to the Sacre Coeur: Agadon's poetry aims high, August 5, 2004

By 

Susan Rich "Poet and Teacher" (Seattle, WA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Small Knots (Paperback)

In this stunning collection Agadon takes us from the Mexican highway to topless beaches, from Cleopatra to Revelations. While her world is vast and wide, Agodon's images are, indeed, small knots of craft and surprise. In poem after poem, this reader delights in the syllables and sounds of lines like "it's the unbutton my shirt conclusion, the tango with needles in my flesh-colored suit."

These poems tell of lives lived deeply in pain and delight. "It's easy to wake up in someone's poem" explores how we end up living in worlds we never expected. "God sets us in boats and pushes us on to the lake," Agadon tells us. I for one, want this book with me as I take the ride.