Practical Anxiety

These poems dwell in the hearth of domesticity, but they look beyond the confines of the home with clear eyes. Boldly unafraid, they confront the realities of climate change, the desecration of habitat, some quiet truths about aging and death. There is no doubt that these are poems written by a woman. But even though many of them deal with the domestic world long considered the ‘domain’ of females, they reach well beyond the realm of the kitchen and tradition. They are a celebration of the quiet glory ensconced in the ‘practical’ nature of the everyday world, even though that world may often feel overwhelmingly filled with ‘anxiety’

AUTHOR

Heidi Greco

Heidi Greco is a longtime resident of Surrey, BC. In addition to writing and editing, she often leads workshops – on topics that range from ekphrastic poetry to chapbook making. She’s been an advocate for the literary arts in her community and was instrumental in establishing two distinct reading series, but she considers her greatest success to have been convincing her city to hire an official Poet Laureate. She writes in many genres – with poems, fiction, essays and book reviews to her credit. Her books include a novella, SHRINKING VIOLETS which was co-winner of the Ken Klonsky Award in 2011. Her work has also appeared in many anthologies, most recently in MAKE IT TRUE: POETRY FROM CASCADIA (Leaf Press, 2015) and THE REVOLVING CITY 51 POEMS AND THE STORIES BEHIND THEM (Anvil, 2015). In addition to making Sunday suppers for her adult sons, she keeps a sporadic blog at outonthebiglimb.blogspot.ca.

Reviews

“Heidi Greco’s abundantly generous new collection, Practical Anxiety, sings “praises to the light.” Not afraid to hold death in her open hands, Greco is also alive to the “happy slurry of life.” This is poetry of breadth and depth, shimmering with firefly-quick intelligence and imagination. It is a book to cherish.”
–Anne Simpson, author of Loop

“Heidi Greco’s poems in Practical Anxiety capture the recollected fears of childhood in the bowl of “bedtime hands,” and acknowledge, to an almost-honouring of, the irky angsts being an adult is amid its “skeltered” piles of unwashed dishes. Greco rewrites the psalms, celebrates threatened “blood-ruddy” ecosystems, reminds us of the dangers in “clutching remotes instead of each other.” This collection of lyrical noticings can’t simply be summed up as “domestic,” but instead must be considered as a set of vital knowings from one fully alive woman’s life. A moving and necessary collection!”
–Catherine Owen, author of The Day of the the Dead and Dear Ghost

“This collection is a triumph. In her detailing of “anxieties” that give her “practical” poems, in her sounding of clear notes of bewilderment, celebration, reflection, intense observation of other people and the natural world, and many-levelled love, Greco signs up her life under a scrupulous, subtle lyricism, with warmth and with never-failing charm.”
–Russell Thornton, author of The Hundred Lives