Poetry. In LID TO THE SHADOW, Alexandria Peary writes about spring, referencing classical Eastern imagery of blossoming cherry trees to talk about childbirth, female desire, motherhood, and absence of memory. This book thrives through its artful use of imagery and voice as well as its beautiful meta-moments and allusions. Peary draws attention to the presence of the poem itself, as though the poem were a moment of space and time. She drags words and symbols out of the flow of the text and makes them three-dimensional. In LID TO THE SHADOW, shadows represent the presence of the past, and meta language becomes the presence of the now.
