sugar the blackberries
JOAN PECK ARNOLD
Paperback • 5.5” x 8.5” • 84 pages • $15
August 2021 • ISBN
978-1-7356783-0-6
Joan Peck Arnold began writing poetry to work through the challenges of later life, in the process arriving at a way of healing and a fresh perspective on the everyday. In these poems, she looks frankly at difficult things—grief and loss, fear and illness, life’s seasons and storms—to locate hope or make peace with what has come and gone. She shows us how to find solace and connection in an object, a memory, or a moment, in our senses, and in the poignant details of ordinary life.
What do we leave behind? What endures? How do we let go? A beautiful and accessible meditation on time, nature, and art, drawing inspiration from ghosts to Van Gogh, Sugar the Blackberries is a resonant collection for poetry enthusiasts and newcomers alike that holds lessons about love and survival for us all, no matter our age.
“Sugar the Blackberries . . . considers the bright freedom of youthful promises and summons the past to capture experiences, regrets, and wisdom. Joan Peck Arnold condenses eighty years of life into poetry that is honest and touching.” —Independent Book Review (read the full review here)
About the Author
Joan Peck Arnold (1931–2023) was born in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and spent the later half of her life in Massachusetts and Maine. Her work has been published in a number of journals, including Soundings Review, Maine Review, and Slant: A Journal of Poetry. She received an International Merit Award from Atlanta Review and an Honorable Mention from Writer’s Digest, and she was featured on Boston’s public radio station, WBUR, where she read her poem “Van Gogh’s Universe” on Here and Now. Joan read and wrote poetry as an essential part of her continuous search for truth and beauty in her life and the world.
