If Sarah Will Take Me

Krystyna Higgins is the former book review editor for the Catholic New
Times.

Painter and motivational speaker Robb Dunfield has been a
ventilator-dependent quadriplegic since falling from a balcony at the
age of 19. This book grew out of a high-school presentation he did
several years ago at which he met Dave Bouchard, a writer and
storyteller. The resulting collaboration was intended to bring
Dunfield’s art to a wider audience.

The poem compares the artist’s experience of nature before his
disability with his present lifestyle. Thus each page begins “If I
could walk,” “If I could breathe / On my own,” etc., and ends with
“if Sarah will take me ...” (Sarah, formerly Dunfield’s nurse, is
now his wife.)

The paintings themselves, mainly landscapes, are quite lovely. Glowing
with color and light, they bear eloquent testimony to their creator’s
love of nature.

Unfortunately, the accompanying text does not do them justice. Though
the layout is visually attractive, the poetry functions as little more
than captions for the paintings, and rather unnecessary ones at that.
The rhythm is plodding and the language prosaic, almost trite at times.

The final page contains a prose “afterword” explaining Dunfield’s
special circumstances and the genesis of the book. No doubt this
placement was chosen to allow the paintings (and text) to be experienced
on their own merits. However, without some sort of explanation in
advance, it is difficult to understand exactly what the poem is about;
there is, for example, a rather obscure reference to “mistakes [of
which] one was too dear!”

Except for one token phrase (“If I could share / My soul with all
children ...”), it is hard to see why this would be classified as a
children’s book at all. For this reason, and because of the inadequacy
of the text, this is not a first-choice purchase, despite the
considerable merits of the artwork.