Not Many Love Poems

At the age of fifty Linda Chase began to publish poems, to win prizes, and to develop her skills as a performer of her own work and a facilitator and impresario for others. Not Many Love Poems is a sensual celebration of the varied relationships that make up lives richly lived and imagined. Chase’s imagination is stimulated by paintings (she was artist-in-residence at Manchester City Art Gallery, and produced ekphrastic work), by gardening, by memory and by love. A battle with cancer resulted in some of her most harrowing and healing work. Her style is insistently demotic: the poems carry her voice: gentle, sharp, wry, loving. The reader senses a generous honesty at work, and an insatiable curiosity. Linda Chase’s wit and sharp eye for telling detail make Not Many Love Poems a collection in which the poet can express heartbreak, and the narratives of the everyday reveal unique moments of insight.