Light on Water

The spare words of John Gearen’s poetry come at you like arrows - silent, swift, striking in quick, piercing thrusts. I found myself taking deep breaths, assessing these impacts, the sharp surprises. Here are ideas that range widely: the experiences not of one life but of generations examined with appealing insight and unerring, spartan clarity. At the same time a droll sense of humor offers warmth and rejuvenation. But these poems never flinch. The drawstring tugging them together is a recounting of the ancient Egyptian embalming tradition, where the heart alone is left in place: in the afterlife with the gods, all that matters is the heart. This is writing that makes you want the writer as your friend. In poems full of love and wry humor, John Gearen chronicles his life from the time of his ancestors and from his beginnings as the eldest child in a strong Irish Catholic family to his current role as grandfather to sometimes errant grandchildren. All of his poems reveal his deep joy in life, family, friends and even golf with Bahamian golfers and bonefishing in his beloved Hope Town. His poems make me laugh and cry, sometimes at the same time, and renew my faith in the human spirit. They comprise a love letter to nature, to his Irish-American family, to the American Midwest, and to the human capacity to persevere. Generous, insightful and full of love, the stories these poems tell are vivid because John pays attention to the smallest detail and makes its meaning bigger. He opens his heart and invites us in, and after reading Light on Water, you will be grateful he did.