T.O. Loveless and Other Poems.

Katherine L. Gordon is an editor and poet in Rockwood, Ontario. She is
the author of An Impact of Butterflies and Saving Camelot.

The little cat in flight on the back cover of this slim, beautifully presented little volume invites you to sail into the many dimensions Andreas Gripp explores within. Is the enigmatic young woman on the front cover T.O. Loveless? Her poem on page 2, filled with the reeking dark side of city, touched by the faint beauty any kind of hope endows, holds the “blood, taste” of near abyss.

The language crackles like “an electric chair” as Gripp takes us to places we usually avoid but are drawn toward as truths under plastic wrap waiting to shock and shake us with their contents. The frayed edges of relationships are combed out for judging in the microscope of Gripp’s detached scrutiny. Uncomfortable wounds that we all try to dress and cover bleed again here; the social, political, and personal lies of society unscabbed. An odd tenderness surfaces at times, as in “November Rose”: I’ll “pray for grace / should the frost strike swift.”

Andreas Gripp’s fascination with characters—their misfits and flaws, their vulnerability and sometimes endearing weaknesses—absorb your interest “in case I need a reason / to speak on matters bleak / but beautiful, / in lieu of love / and poems.”

This is a provocative and entertaining contemporary book. Take it with your coffee into any scene and watch the facets of life, caught glinting here, become the action that unravels the search. The gold ring at the end of the ride is not promised, but you will find you’ll “have excuse / for imperfection.”