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Porcellino, John & Lorenzutti, Stefan – The Stoneware Jug
There’s this disconnect in my brain, and I’m becoming more and more aware of it as I get older. I think of myself as somebody who doesn’t enjoy poetry, and I’m certainly not somebody who seeks it out. But when a book like this lands in my lap, and I enjoy literally every poem in it, with the only problem being that I wish that it was longer, well, what am I supposed to take away from that? But hey, this is not about me, even though my rambling in reviews may make that difficult to determine. These are poems written by Stefan and illustrated by John. If you’ve seen John’s work over the years (and I’m just assuming that everybody reading this has), then you’d know that his sparse, expansive artwork would be perfect for short poems like this. I’m not familiar with Stefan at all, but after reading this I’m thinking that maybe I should fix that. There are so very many books on his website, and I have no idea where to start, so maybe I’ll just do a blind buy one of these days. Anyway! These poems range from one to several panels (although none longer than a page), with the page title on the otherwise blank page opposite the image. It’s fair to say that “quiet contemplation” is the overall theme, but subjects include the right drink for the right season, the quiet walk to the cemetery, a silent fire on a hillside, tractors, peace in heat, and the various types of orange heat. These are intentionally vague descriptions, of course, as I could easily put all of the text from this comic in place of what I’ve written so far and it would probably be about the same word count. So basically if you already like poetry, well, here’s John Porcellino illustrating some of it, so you’re obviously ordering this right now. If you’re like me and think you don’t like poetry, read this one specifically. Maybe you’ll also either find out that you were wrong about that, or you should at least put more thought into that opinion. Oh, and the profits for this go towards children traumatized by the war in Ukraine, which is one more huge reason to support it. $8
