Magnum Mysterium is Irish American poet Julie O'Callaghan's first collection since Tell Me Normal: New & Selected Poems (2008). Her new poems have evolved from the early monologues - written in American demotic - to poems of heartache on the death of her husband, the poet Dennis O'Driscoll. But even in these harrowing poems she never loses her ear for the absurdities of modern life - including the grieving process where she can "see" her husband alive and doing what he loves. In Magnum Mysterium Julie O'Callaghan has continued writing poems which 'seem effortless and are immediately accessible and achieve great emotional weight by the lightest of means' (Michael Hartnett Award citation).
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[I live on an island / But that's not the worst part / Water sloshes uncontrollably / at the edges / of this entire geological formation (ISLAND LIFE)]***
(@BloodaxeBooks, 30 April 2020, e-book, 96 pages, borrowed from @natpoetrylib via @OverDriveLibs)
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I'd heard of the poet and her late husband but have never actually read any of her work. I really enjoyed the poems in this collection. They poems are fun for the most past, teasing and light. I liked the imagery used throughout. The collection is split into two halves, the second half After Dennis O'Driscoll which focuses on his death and the aftermath. I enjoyed this part of the collection the most. The poems are raw, intense and almost devastating. They were so intimate and sad I felt uncomfortable reading them at times. The best poems from the first half are Island Life, Riddle and No Longer with Us. The best poems from the second half are Me & Our House, Pup and Cyber You.
