THE UNSWEPT ROOM by Sharon Olds
Customer Rating: 
This is not poetry! It is the rantings of a woman obsessed with herself and her anguish. I don't care.
Her verse is sexually explicit and offensive, in particular the poem titled "Sunday Night" in which she recounts the improper, what could even be considered the criminal behavior of her father towards the waitresses at the restaurants her family would frequent. What is worse, when this poem was written and published, her father was deceased, and unable to answer to these statements. I wonder if these behaviors actually took place, and, it not, why would the poet sully the name of her dead father? Also, what impact did this poem have on her mother? Perhaps Ms. Olds can write a poem to address these issues.
I cannot recommend this dreadful "poetry" to anyone.
Sincerely,
Catherine Ross
A Glimpse Over The Wall
Customer Rating: I'm a guy, 62 years old, day job
as a herder-of-diesel mechanics
in a small shipyard. Voracious appetite
for poetry for the most recent few
years of my life.
Along now comes "The Unswept Room."
The cover art is worth the price
of the book. Inside is a voyage
that defines travel at it's apex.
I'm captured from the beginning with
Olds' fluidity, warmth, and, excuse the use
of a well-worn word in re: poetry,
her clarity.
It's not easy to penetrate the soul
of a man used for years to the
bending of wrenches.
The body of work in this book
set me up for just such a piercing.
Then early this morning, I got to
"April, New Hampshire."
Brought the salty fluid to bathe
my eyes, but none fell out.
A few pages on, "The Learner"
nailed me to wall.
I thought "The Red Queen" had taught
me more than one gender should know
about the other, from a scientific
line of sight.
Ms. Olds has taken this salty old codger
staightaway into her soul, her feminine soul.
I will be forever grateful.
Ladies--You may have kindred candles lit for you.
Gentlemen--You may learn from the light
of those candles.
Lee
