"Leaf Litter" by Bell Thompson. The description for this was left bare. I went in expecting a lot of metaphors about nature. I enjoy nature poems even if other people think they're cliche or overdone. This goes far beyond just poems about trees. In a way, it's about being a frightened creature existing for the amusement of men. Sometimes it's about the tender but violent love of both flora and fauna. Maybe it's about human guilt for existing as a being which seems to do so much to the life of the rest of the world around us. It's not always little creatures, because these complex relationships and personification is played out by all forms of non-human life. It is a very captivating collection I could definitely see a more extensive compilation of over time. If you really sit with these poems and stop and think and reread them and try to take the perspective that every sentence offers you it's hard not to feel surprisingly overwhelmed with the messages you leave with. It's not just nature poems, even if it is about the "natural world".
You are the fish, the mouse, the cactus, the orange, the human in every story, the garden, the background, the scenery, the tank, the self-destructive being who knows some people only care about your self-destruction because it makes you less attractive to them. You don't want to be any of these things. Maybe you think you aren't any of them. Maybe you fear you are all of them and you hate that. Maybe being those things is in your past now, but you're still going to think about it for the rest of the afternoon. It will come to mind the next time you're in those places, wherever they may be. It also speaks quietly to the stories of the people who feel obligated to love men and how that affects them later on in their relationships with women. It's a message that's very loud to me, but only because I know it personally. In a way you wouldn't expect such a collection about destroying fruit the way we destroy our bodies to leave you so hungry. Hungry for more poetry telling all these different stories because they give you something you didn't realize you want and need to read more of, now that you're in a place where you can. Maybe you should read them even if you can't.
Perhaps they really are just nature poems, and the point of them is to make you believe that they're more than that. I don't believe that from reading it. There's too much of that quiet inexpressible pain that privately observed self-loathing creates where only you know it.
"The man who polishes the patterned glass bowl will be upset by the biting; it gives her such a ragged appearance. But he understands. Bettas are prone to fin rot, muscle damage. Try to swim with an evening-gown. Try to cry with a face full of makeup, beautifully arranged."