I had seen Lavina Blossom’s artwork before I had read her poetry. So when she approached Mark Givens and I about a book, we thought it would be lovely to issue a book that highlights both aspects of her artistry. In Here to Be Remade, Blossom has gathered a cohesive collection of poems that allow the reader to pause and marvel at some of her art, which is liberally sewn throughout the book. Here to be Remade is available worldwide today and is also available direct from us.
Lavina Blossom is a poet and artist and this fine illustrated collection represents both facets of her skill. In a self-imposed rule for her poetry, she restricts her vocabulary, spinning gold out of an almost random choice of the words of other poets. Rearranging them to achieve “an alphabet written on the wind.” Meanwhile, a fly, magnified in all its iridescent splendor alights between the poems Light and Breath and Utter Happening, followed by Pears in a Red Bowl, a concerto of red, yellow and green, then white-haloed Poppies limned against a sea of black. As if listening to a conversation held in a faraway room, Lavina Blossom resurrects and refines unrealized connections we hold in common. She gives us “…a fire in a box that crackles.”
—Ruth Bavetta, author of What’s Left Over (FutureCycle Press)