Beating the Bounds by Liz Ahl
Let me begin with disclaimer: This is not a review of Liz Ahl's first book-length collection of poems, Beating the Bounds . Liz is a longtime friend who sometimes writes about the place where I live and people I know, so anything I say about this book's qualities ought to be suspect. Further, I'm not very good at writing about poetry. I read a lot of poetry — well, "a lot" in comparison to most Americans, certainly, and probably in comparison to most writers who are not themselves poets — but have no facility for writing about poetry with much more insight than, "I like this line," or "Doesn't that sound nice?" What this post is, then, is not a review but a notice, plus quotations and anecdotes. Notice: Liz Ahl has published her first book-length collection of poems, Beating the Bounds . No book better captures what it looks like, smells like, sounds like, feels like to live in rural central New Hampshire than this book. That may s...