[Mary Meriam]

EXOT BOOKS published my first poetry collection, a chapbook, The Countess of Flatbroke, in 2006. Fifteen years later, Nemo again offered to publish a book of mine, Pools of June, with the official publication date of 2/2/22, but available now for purchase at EXOT.

Here are the blurbs:

In this collection, filled with linguistic surprises and narrative leaps, Meriam upends the charm, ghazal, pantoum and sonnet to deliver poems of extraordinary originality. The erotic and a passionate connection to the natural world inform Meriam’s agile, imaginative poems.
—Robin Becker, author of The Black Bear Inside Me

The quality of freshness is not strained in Mary Meriam’s work. Vision, hearing and form interact in these poems to convey a sense of beauty and purpose. It takes a deft touch to kindle a new wick. How far this poet’s candle casts its light in a dark world.
—Alfred Corn, author of Unions

The translucent materials of the natural world that frequent Meriam’s ontological homes, owl-call her rich wisdom on the nature of life and existence to return to its queenly throne.
—Vi Khi Nao

Possessed of a voice both starkly candid and utterly otherworldly, Mary Meriam inhabits the varied forms of these extraordinary poems as naturally as a tree wears its leaves.
—Mark McDonnell

As if all this wasn’t joy enough, Joshua Mehigan wrote about one of the poems in Pools of June, “Dictionary of Owl,” at Root Quarterly. It’s print only, but there’s an excerpt HERE. And the poem he’s writing about is HERE.

Yesterday, I read from Pools of June live on Zoom at Carmine Street Metrics (CSM), and the video’s on YouTube. My reading starts around 1:09 HERE.

If you’d like to review Pools of June, please send me a message.

I included “the Critters” on the dedication page, and thank you again for all your excellent crits. And thank you, Alex, for creating a venue where I could meet Nemo in the first place!

Mary