By Kayla King
FROM: Good Reads

Reading Ingrid M. Calderon-Collins’ Ablution, takes readers through the early days of love and beyond. Time passes, as it must. The narrative built within these poems, traverses the relationship between these lovers with a close lens, many titled with just a month and year. It feels too intimate at times, and readers might be compelled to look away, but that’s only a sign to keep reading.

Throughout this collection, there are gut-punch lines, such as: “The cold is an excuse to gather limbs like origamis to ignore the voice of reason and act like secrets do,” and “The things I find when I’m alone serve as small trinkets that crumble when held with soft intentions.” Where many poets writing about love might dip too closely to the cliche, Collins instead cleaves open the idea of love to provide knockout writing that will be sure to keep you wondering and hoping until the end.

What’s more, as readers continue to live side by side with these lovers, so too will they pick up on the hint of another character in these lives: the city of Los Angeles. And in much the same way, the apartment of these lovers serves as a reflection of their relationship and love as it grows and changes. In one such poem, there is the kind of specificity that leads to the most authentic of writing. The husband prepares a drink for the wife: “…Then whisky. Topped with club soda and a lemon wheel because I’m a round missile, and a wedge wouldn’t do my explosive heart justice.” Within this same poem, there is the briefest exploration of thoughts of children and what comes next: “Our plants do well in this environment, they sprout smaller versions of themselves, birthing babies. Mocking us.” The trappings of their lives together become as real as these lovers seem on the page. Read Rest of Review Here