When memory is a search-and-rescue mission, the struggle through to morning is a struggle through mourning
In this poetic exploration of love and loss amplified by personal and sociopolitical passings, award-winning author Daphne Gottlieb declares an indictment of systems, from systems created to leave people dying in the streets (“the bullet teaches us how to dance”) to the systematic erosion of memory due to dementia (“yahrzeit”). In the absence of any indoctrination around ritualizing death, Gottlieb was drawn to memorialize her experiences of the past through poems, including “my dog teaches me things,” about the final lessons learned from her best friend, a chihuahua. What shines through in every poem is the exceptional moments that create love, how we survive the heartbreak of profound loss, and what we get to keep and carry with us always.