The Hell With Love

You take your poetry where you find it. Such is the case with the small anthology called The Hell With Love: poems to mend a broken heart edited by Mary D. Esselman & Elizabeth Ash Velez. From the back cover:

Passionate, edgy, funny, and profound. The Hell With Love is for anyone who has ever suffered the pain of breaking up--and everyone who believes in the unique power of poetry to console and transform.

We've all been there...probably more often than we'd care to admit. Interpreted by a pair of wise and witty editors, these poems make up a one-of-a-kind collection that helps you through the classic stages of heartbreak. From John Donne to Margaret Atwood, from Pablo Neruda to Gwendolyn Brooks, here are poems that dig into the hurt and anger, poems that bring comfort and perspective, and poems that encourage you to get over your ex and move on.

That last short phrase 'move on' grates. Other than that it's a book of good poems. I won't comment on the commentary supplied to each section of the book. Some will adore them and others won't.

Here are a couple of poems from the first section called Rage.

wishes for sons

i wish them cramps.
i wish them a strange town
and the last tampon.
i wish them no 7-11.

i wish them one week early
and wearing a white skirt.
i wish them one week late.

later i wish them hot flashes
and clots like you
wouldn't believe. let the
flashes come when they
meet someone special.
let the clots come
when they want to.

let them think they have accepted
arrogance in the universe,
then bring them to gynecologists
not unlike themselves.

Lucille Clifton

Or this nice one.

Hatred

I shall hate you
Like a dart of singing steel
Shot through still air
At even-tide.
Or solemnly
As pines are sober
When they stand etched
Against the sky.
Hating you shall be a game
Played with cool hands
And slim fingers.
Your heart will yearn
For the lonely splendor
Of the pine tree;
While rekindled fires
In my eyes
Shall wound you like swift arrows.
Memory will lay its hands
Upon your breast
And you will understand
My hatred.

Gwendolyn Bennett

The selections mellow a bit after the poems from the first section. Pity.