Lenard Moore, a North Carolina poet, playwright, essayist and literary critic, founded and serves as executive director of the Carolina African American Writers' Collective. Recipient of the 1996 Indies Arts Award, he was featured in the television documentary "Ark of the Spirit" based on the 1996 National Black Arts Festival. Author of four poetry chapbooks, including "Desert Storm: A Brief History," a haiku collection that quickly sold out, "Forever Home" is his first full length free verse collection.

In these 54 poems, Lenard Moore returns to North Carolina, the place of his youth during the 1950s and 1960s. The memory path on which he walks calls up clear images of a life of hard work in the cotton, tobacco and blueberry fields, and the poverty he and his people endured. While empathetic, Lenard presents these hardships without overstatement or melodrama. Through the eyes of his younger self, his focus is more on the purity of love, faith, nature. And rightly so. This approach works perfectly.

In the (often quiet) telling of these poems, Lenard's rhythmic voice reflects a deep reverence and love for family. In "Praisesong: From Son to Mother," for example, we find a vivid and moving portrait of the memories of his humble home life. An excerpt:

I think of you: how
you picked purple collards
from the backyard garden,
got hog-meat fresh from great-grandma.
This was routine.
At dusk, with father home from teaching mechanics,
you set the redwood table.
We ate by candles.
Nobody spoke, the only sound
the noise of spoons and forks
scraping tin plates.

Lenard also allows us to witness the grueling, seemingly endless, toil that his people and migrant workers endured. The poet's sympathy and indignation are evident in images such as "speechless crows"; "boot-worn feet"; "brown feet /like a pendulum/stamp endless rows/of blueberry fields"; "clutching cotton/ like machinery"; "he falls facedown/upon a wilted row/ windblown tobacco/plants."

COTTONPICKERS

In a heavy rain the
cottonpickers don't
dash but creep

right out of the
field like snails

It should be mentioned that Lenard Moore is a haiku poet as well, so it is not surprising that similarities of this discipline surface in several poems here. Those familiar with haiku (an ancient Japanese poetry form) will recognize the resemblance in the following poem:

Sun Poem

Sun in
the lake
her face

in its
face
staring

For a pleasing balance, this able poet includes poems on a humorous note. However, most of these begin on a serious note, ending with light humor that contains a thought-provoking twist. In one poem, for example, the poet tells of smacking his old bulldog on the nose for stalking a young peacock, saying he is "angry, even ashamed" of his pet's intention to kill the bird. The poem concludes: "The young peacock returns/mingles with the white chickens/while I gather their new eggs." (A Young Peacock)

Altogether, poems here paint a vivid, colorful personal and social history. Presented in an intelligible style, this book makes for an easy and rewarding read. As in life, through simplicity evolves depth, and so it is with these poems the more one reads this collection the richer and more meaningful it becomes. "Forever Home" will undoubtedly retain its freshness and value long into the future.

Copyright © 2000 by Elizabeth St Jacques