Voices in the air: Poems for listeners by Naomi Nye by Marissa Posada

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Justification: As someone who is still trying to get into poetry, I chose this book since it was written by an award winning author. I also liked what the synopsis said about the poems. The synopsis saying that we should learn wisdom from those that are no longer here and also those who are here and close to us. It seemed like an inspirational and calming book. Everyone needs a little inspiration and clam in this world.

Evaluation: This book has a great example of precise vocabulary. The author explain when they learned the word yutori. It translates to the life-space and explains how this word is exemplified in many ways, but the overall theme is space to be and listen. She then compares how this world is like poetry. Poetry is a way fro someone to stop and make a statement about how life is at that moment. This really setup for the reader how to interpret the poems in this book. As I read the poems a lot of them connected to what is going on right now in this world.

As mentioned in the previous paragraph, the poems connect to a lot of issues going on the world. The book does this through understatement. There are so many poems talking about the political atmosphere going on today. The best example of this is the poem “Propriety.” It does not mention politics, but it does mention the “red and blue” and “convention.” Another one that talks about politics is “Big Bend National Park” says no to all walls, even the title is an understatement to Trump’s wall. It also talks about climate change in the poem “To Babies,” with the line “ so many details is now disappeared…” It is talking about all of the flora and fauna that are going extinct thanks to the way we treat the earth and how the children will not be able to see them because they are now extinct.

As poetry tends to have, the book has multiple instances of unexpected insight. The poem “Broken,” made me reread it multiple times in order to realize that it was talking about health. The poem is about being thankful for the simple gift of using your hands. Another poem, “Life loves,” gives the insight on how things change and how some people don’t want to. The best one would be, “Getting Over It.” It gives a story of how a friend had his stuff stole and after searching for hours says, “How long does one stay robbed, after being robbed? I think I’m over it.” The author retells the situation to another friend who breaks down and says, “…Thanks what I’ve been needing to hear. Such a gift!”

Response: The introduction with the explanation of the term yutori was very enlightening to me. I believe that it has helped me to understand poetry more. A lot of the opinions in this book aligned with my own. I had never thought of poetry as political or as a way to express views. After writing that sentence, I know that was a dumb thought, but a lot of the poems were on issues I had opinions on. Maybe I’ve been reading poetry without thinking of the context. I actually really enjoyed the text, even if there were a few poems I would need to go back and ponder about some more.

Conclusion: This book had good examples of precise vocabulary, understatement, and unexpected insight. This is a good book of poems that cover a range of ideas, including the political climate, climate change, and views of other writers. Since there are poems about current events, I think this is a good poetry book for young adults who have a hard time with poetry.

APA Citation: Nye. N. (2018). Voices in the air: Poems for listeners. New York: Greenwillow Books.