In "Trees," Cheryl Savageau writes to her father: "You taught me the land so well / that all through my childhood / I never saw the highway, / the truckstops, lumberyards, / the asphalt works, / but instead saw the hills, / the trees, the ponds on the south end / of Quinsigamond that twined / through the tangled underbrush / where old cars rusted back to earth, / and rubber tires made homes for fish." Savageau is just one of the excellent poets whose work makes this collection shine. Her work, like many of the other poets, strikes a remarkable balance between an ancient vision and the modern world, a respect for tradition and an understanding of the present. The title of the collection gets at this underlying tension beautifully. Breath is transient and insubstantial, of course, but in the words we speak, we can breathe life into others and bring ideas alive.
Review
An important contribution to Native American poetry is this anthology of poems from a range of writers. Central themes include movement between loss and gain and images of home: important keys to understanding the Native American experience. -- Midwest Book Review
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