Geoff Inverarity writes poems for people who don’t like poetry (and
those who do).

In this debut collection Inverarity writes of broken things, things that
have come apart at the seams, things that ought not to but sometimes do
dissolve with time: friendships, relationships, promises, aging parents,
hearts, bodies, love, and even time itself. But it’s not all shattered
dreams and sad-luck stories here, there is hope and optimism too – in
the future, in the Now, and in the heat and power of the coming
generations. And there are poems of memory, poems for grandfathers and
aging aunts, children and lost loves. Inverarity also probes the the
multitude of possibilities “in this fallen world of compromises,” gently
reminding us that “we’re stockpiling for the short term / the long term
we don’t know. / No matter how much you prepare / there’s always
something new looming / like the Unexploded Grief Bomb.” It is a world
where we struggle to give back the past, to finally get to the point
“where the past does not exist” and “where all history is now.”

The penultimate entry is “Mars Variations,” a wonderfully extended suite
of complementary poems, a time-traveling fractal narrative: a sci-fi
horror movie for the ears, referencing works as disparate as Julius
Caesar’s Gallic Wars and H.G. Wells’ The War of the Worlds, Wordsworth’s
“Prelude,” and horror films like Robin Hardy’s The Wicker Man along with
nods towards the various iterations of Godzilla; and of course the
classic 1962 “Mars Attacks” Topp’s Bubble Gum cards – which form a
framing device. The sequence explores the relationship between time,
fiction, and facts; between public history and private experience.

The book concludes with a short Epilogue, assuring us that “one day, all
the broken things will be mended.”