Book Review: Dream Diary
Dream Diary. Katia Mitova. Virtual Artists Collective: www.vacpoetry.org, March 15, 2013, Trade Paperback, 92 pages.
Review by Cronin Detzz.
Mitova bursts strong right out of the gate with a poem incredibly appealing to the eyes by splitting two thoughts with white space, then slowly bringing each line closer together. The visual result forms a letter “y.” The title of the poem is “from the Emperor’s B&B book.” Dream Diary uses the mechanism of “B&B” throughout, using phrases such as, “Black and Bright,” “Being & Becoming,” or “Bold & Bashful.” The title of her last chapter is “B&B”, with one of the letters backwards and mirroring the other.
I try to teach other poets to remember that readers are highly visual creatures, and Mitova understands this. She even goes so far as to place short poems in the bottom right-hand corner of each chapter heading, with each line in a different font.
In short, she is a true artist.
Her poems are collections of dreams. Naturally, the poems are surreal and slightly disjointed, similar to the way we humans dream. For example, on page 25 in a poem entitled, “gateway,” she writes:
“where a woman humming before the mirror / disentangles the young sun from the honey / of her hair and sends it up to the sky”
Mitova introduces us to words that will be new to many readers. On page 67, we learn the meaning behind ancient words like okwa and Kush from the “almost extinct language of the Tehuelche Indians of Southern Patagonia.” In the poem entitled, “Native Word,” we read the imaginative way she uses the word peperuda, and on page 14 we learn about the word albedo, which has multiple meanings that refer to a white reflection. I especially loved Mitova’s mastery in the use of color throughout her poetry.
I cannot even pretend to tell you that I understood all of the poems. Because poetry is such a subjective form of art, it will not always have purpose that can be easily divined. Think of the difference between an abstract painting compared to the paintings in the Sistine Chapel. Both paintings are meant to inspire; however, only the Sistine Chapel’s purpose is commonly understood. If MItova’s intent was to create an abstract painting of poetry, she has masterfully succeeded. If she intended to have the reader understand deeper subcurrents, then I would suggest framing each chapter by explaining more of the themes and interpretations at the beginning of each chapter. But it should be restated that not every poet wants clean, bright lines of understanding and interpretation.
Congratulations to Katia Mitova for creating her own abstract work of art.