As an avid reader who enjoys reading poetry collections, I have noticed a recurring trend among these books: They are often short.

As someone who grew up on the tomes of Shakespeare, Poe, Yeats and Dickinson, I have always been used to reading large volumes of poetry. When I bought the poetry collection of Audre Lorde, I savored the numerous pages of her poems. And when I bought a collection of animal poems, I was delighted at the large number of poems available to read.

However, I have come across many poetry books which were short collections of poetry. I define short as in “under 100 pages” but some of them have been even less. The ones under 100 pages still qualify as “short poetry books” since most books are typically longer. Yet with poetry, it would seem that the shorter they are, the more attractive they may be.

Here are just some of the short poetry books I have had the pleasure of reading:

· Blooming Red: Christmas Poetry for the Rational by Carolyn Howard-Johnson and Magdalena Ball

· Words Left Unspoken by J.A. McGovern

· Unspoken: An Anthology of Poetry

·Within Her Thoughts by K. Vincent

·The Passion of Love by Suzan L. Wiener

·Cringerotica by Soli

·Darkness: Poems of extreme horror by Eric Kapitan

·Relative Sanity by Ellen Lord

·Songs of Kabir by Kabir

·Troubled Times Ahead by Steven Burton

One of my favorite poetry books is a short collection of poems: Tracings by Carolyn Howard-Johnson. It is the kind of book I can turn to for a quick dose of thoughtful poetry and I love how the poet captures so much in such a short book. A short collection of poems has the potential of speaking volumes and leaving a lasting impression on the reader. So, in the case of short poetry books, it’s a matter of quality and not quantity. (Note: Tracings is no longer in print for purchase, but Carolyn has generously agreed to send a reader a free poem from the book if they email here at HOJONEWS(at)aol(dot)com.)

In Tracings, though, is the poem "Perfectly Flawed," which is reprinted in Carolyn's newer poetry book, Imperfect Echoes. Some of the poems in that book are about the cruelties and realities of war, along with the impact it has on families. So it's understandable that it's reprinted in this book, because it's about an uncle who leaves to go to war.

Imperfect Echoes is not a short poetry book (it has 133 pages), but it is one of the poetry books I read for National Poetry Month this year. One poem I particularly liked was “Television for Children in the Seventies.”

Television for Children in the

Seventies

By Carolyn Howard-Johnson

I monitored the flickering tube.

Now my daughter laments, Sesame Street

till I was twelve. Hodge Podge

Lodge, Captain Kangaroo,

Electric Company.

Then, “Time’s up.”

Not soon enough.

I watched CBS at 6 while I creamed

her tuna for toast. She knows

Kermit as well as her Mother Goose

but mostly remembers

body bags coming home.  

(Poem reprinted from Imperfect Echoes with the author’s permission. Copyright © 2015 by Carolyn Howard-Johnson)

Poetry has a way of capturing life in a way which prose cannot. Through imagery, symbolism, metaphor and sensory writing, poems are able to communicate to readers in a way that is similar to a secret language only they can understand. The problem is that most readers tend to interpret this language differently, but the universal message of a poem is usually easily recognizable, as can be seen in the above poem.

With short poetry books, the author is faced with the difficult task of ensuring the small number of poems they have included are sufficient, if not satisfying to the reader.

As a writer, the appeal of short poetry books is something I understand well. When I made the leap to get my poetry books published, I started out with chapbooks. My poetry chapbooks rarely had over thirty poems in each publication. I did try doing a longer collection of poetry with the autobiographical collection Touched by Fire, but I mostly stuck to poetry chapbooks. Still, of my poetry books, I think it’s a good idea to have both short and long volumes available for readers. My poetry book, Poems for the Grieving Heart, is only 40 pages, but it is my only poetry book that continues to attract readers.

Then I was challenged to write a collection of poems that contained over fifty poems. The result was a collection of eighty poems, which I am currently shopping around.

After that exhausting attempt, however, I went back to creating chapbooks of poems. For some reason, smaller collections of poetry were easier for me to write. I could only write so many poems on one topic and hold a reader’s interest in my poetry for only so long.

And therein is perhaps why short poetry books are so popular these days. Aside from not being so pricey and not being a very heavy book to carry around, short poetry books are quick reads for the kind of readers who not only enjoys reading poetry but prefers to read poetry books in one sitting.

Even so, most readers of poetry will rarely fly right though a collection of verse. Myself, I am the kind of reader who enjoys taking my time absorbing the poetry I read in books. I allow the two or three poems I read to linger in my mind and I often think about what I just read.

One of the joys of reading poetry is being captivated by the poet’s gift for writing verse full of sensory detail, evocative ideas and new perspectives. The poet reliving a memory from childhood in which they broke down in tears over a lost toy or of how they felt after their first kiss takes us down our own Memory Lanes in which we, too, relive those moments.

Another reason why short poetry books are popular is because poetry is so hard to sell these days, let alone attract readers. A reader unfamiliar with a poet may see the short book and think that they won’t be investing too much of their time in reading something new by a writer they have never read before. They are willing to take a chance on unfamiliar poets if the book is a quick read. But if the book is something long they’ll have to plod through? Probably not much interest there.

There really is no rule on how long a collection of poetry can be. It can be short or long, depending on the poet (or the publisher).

For the influx of short poetry books hitting the market, however, there are one set of readers happy to have more short poetry books to read in one sitting. And another set of readers who will read such books at leisure, one poem at a time.

BIO:

Dawn Colclasure is a Deaf burn survivor who lives with her husband and children in Oregon. Her articles, essays, poems and short stories have appeared in several newspapers, anthologies, magazines and E-zines. She is a former journalist and poetry editor. She is the author and co-author of over four dozen books, among them Parenting Pauses: Life as a Deaf Parent; On the Wings of Pink Angels: Triumph, Struggle and Courage Against Breast Cancer; A Ghost on Every Corner; and her autobiographical poetry collection, Touched by Fire. She publishes the free monthly newsletter, The SPARREW Newsletter, and she writes a monthly column for First Chapter Plus Magazine as well as Monstrous Femme Magazine. Her websites are at https://dawnsbooks.com/ and https://www.dmcwriter.com/ Her Twitter is @dawncolclasure. Her insta is dawn10325.