The Hurting Kind, Ada Limon, 2022. I don’t read much poetry so I find it difficult to respond to this collection but I’m glad I was introduced to it. I learned about Limon, a former US poet laureate, through Tricycle’s Daily Dharma. In these poems, Limon eloquently discusses the interconnections between people and with nature. She focuses on moments of what might be called ultimate presence which she mostly finds in nature, such as a kingfisher simply existing in its environment, or a half burned tree living what is left of its life despite its dead half. I read these poems as suggestions of how we could live our lives, being more in tune with our surroundings and accepting the simplicity of embracing our inner lives. Or as Limón says in the poem In the Shadow, ‘Why can’t I just love the flower for being a flower?’

A Mountain to the North, A Lake to the South, Paths to the West, A River to the East, László Krasznahorkai, 2003. Translated from Hungarian by Ottilie Mulzet, 2022. A very enjoyable novella from Krasznahorkai with typical cryptic meanings and beautiful meandering thought passages. The core of the novel is about the grandson of Prince Genji who searches for the perfect garden hidden in a monastery. There are wonderful descriptions of exquisite building procedures, architecture, and nature but also a great deal of more disturbing images like dead goldfish, a dying dog, and a Buddha with a turned head so he would not have to see ‘this wretched world.’ A book worth spending time with teasing out the imagery and meditations on less than perfect human behavior.