Review of Toti O'Brien's "An Alphabet of Birds" by Mari Werner

 

Book Review by Mari Werner: An Alphabet of Birds by Toti O’Brien

Published in Poetry Letter No. 1, 2021, California State Poetry Society

Los Angeles: Moonrise Press, October 2020; 

http://www.moonrisepress.com/alphabet-of-birds.html

ISBN 978-1-945938-41-2, paperback, 184 pp, $15.00; 

ISBN 978-1-945938-42-9, ebook in ePub, $10.00

Preview by Quill and Parchment - New Books Announcement

http://quillandparchment.com/archives/Feb2021/vol236.html

In mindfulness meditation, the object of the practice is to be fully present in the moment. In Toti O’Brien’s prose collection, An Alphabet of Birds, the stories are told by a narrator who is keenly in the moment and acutely perceptive—so much so that the reading experience can become like a meditation. This is a prose collection but it’s difficult to nail down whether they’re stories, essays, or prose poems, fiction or creative non-fiction. And it isn’t necessary. These are literary pieces told through a rare and distinctive voice that slips effortlessly from the real to the surreal, and from the outer to the inner world. The details that bring a story to life and bring a universe into the mind of the reader are poured so naturally into the pages that it’s easy to forget one is reading.

The title of the piece, Five Senses, may be something of a representation of the character of the book— except that it turns out not to be limited to five. This particular piece is an intriguing exploration of the perceptions, influences, and decisions that shape or foreshadow the vectors of life from an early age. It begins with the inner story of a small child quenching her thirst for sense, experience, and understanding under the wise tutelage of her grandparents, or out on her own roaming orchards and wild ravines.

Her explorations and the expansion of her world come to life in full detail, but at the same time other senses are invoked in the reader, such as developing a love for the grandfather or feeling the apprehensive chill of another side of the child’s life. “Back in town with her parents, in winter, she’ll start school. When spring and the swallows will come she will return South, Grandma promises. Right. She begins waiting for spring without further ado.” 

The words are beautifully written without calling attention to themselves. They conjure another realm without particular regard for the confines of time and the standard definitions of how things work in the ‘real’ world. Most of the pieces are not linear, they ride conceptually in what flows like gliding down a river on a raft. 

O’Brien paints both the outer and the inner landscape in vivid detail. In Sunset Walk, the reason for the deep grieving taking place in the inner world of the walker is never revealed, but the grief is interwoven as the outer world plays in full color texture and motion. “And I long for every house, for every life I haven’t lived, feeling both its sweet promise and its irreparable loss.”

Parts of the book are humorous in a wry matter-of-fact way devoid of any self-conscious effort to make you laugh. For example, the squirrel contemplating an orange in Creation: “Judging by the gravity of its frown it must be debating large matters, either the original sin (the type of fruit makes no difference, all round juicy things work, temptation-wise) or else global issues such as climate change, inequality, resource shortage…” Or in Darwin where the reader enters a place in which everyone knows a bird doesn’t fly. “It can’t for a crucial reason, a deal-breaker. Such a feat would take lots of oxygen, and birds talk too much. In fact, they never stop. That is why fish fly, dear, fish only. Because they shut up.” One may be left wondering if other assumptions about the structures of reality have evaporated too. 

TOTI O'BRIEN

The pieces, even the humorous ones, are philosophical, but never by way of bringing messages tied up in packages. The narrating voice is deeply inquisitive and observant, not just of physical perceptions and the inner emotional realm, but also of the world at large, the universe, the perennial questions related to being a human on Earth. It raises questions, opens doors, explores ideas—such as this from the first-person piece, September, as the narrator listens to Beethoven’s Choral Fantasy: “Quite a simple message. Sursum corda, be brave, never give up. Isn’t it what Beethoven always intends? He did. The man is long dead. But his notes are resounding against my bones, striking my membranes. They vibrate through my throat, echo within my ears. The composer is dead, but he’s not…I know it is common sense. Still, how common is that? What outlives the body, where, why?”

Though this work visits many different emotions and situations, overall, it provides a collection of clear windows into colors, tastes, textures and music of life that are there to be experienced—if you’re paying attention. This is gifted writing that deserves a broad readership and critical attention.

~ Mari Werner, Claremont, CA

Published in California State Poetry Society's "Poetry Letter," no. 1, 2021, in PDF format and on CSPS Blog: https://www.californiastatepoetrysociety.com/2021/02/poetry-letter-no-1-2021-reviews-of.html