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Book Review: Poet unravels the mystery of love
Book: The Many Silences of Love
Author: H. Lloyd Weston
Dr Glenville Ashby, Critic
We have all been smitten, bitten by a whirl of emotions that we call love. It’s a unique feeling that melts the heart of the stoic and stirs unbridled sensibility in the most vulnerable. Years ago, a popular musical group sang the popular refrain, “I want to know what love is. I want you to show me.”
In “The Many Silences of Love” author and poet, H. Lloyd Weston dares to answer an enigma that so
The book cover of The Many Silences of Love 001
many have failed to unravel. Is love heightened infatuation? Is it a sobering gesture of affection? Is it an emotional intoxicant that dazzles and destroys the senses? Once unleashed, can it be likened to an incorrigible beast that destroys the individual? Is it cruel? Is it kind?
Weston wrestles with love’s multiplex faces. It’s a herculean task, but he pretty much comes close to deciphering this emotional vortex. He simplifies love, making it more comprehensible. Almost effortlessly, he likens love to the colour, beauty and cyclical character of nature.
His metaphorical leanings are detailed and crisp. His tonal quality is even and soothing. His beat is structured, rhythmic and fluidly cadenced. Weston is the consummate wordsmith and he entertains to the hilt. Moreover, he proves to be a romantic, in touch with his sense and sensibility. He is gratuitous for being in love, but is well aware of the gnawing feeling of emptiness. He knows and feels the pain, the searing and maddening hurt that destroys the mind and incapacitates the body. He is a school boy overwhelmed by desire. He is a man who will accept and savour a touch, a caress, and a moment of quietude with his partner. Here, love is sublime and ethereal. Carnality is absent and hardly missed.
In “The Arms of Love” he writes, “We lie transfixed in Love’s hypnotic spell, fully clothed, except for naked emotions. That is how love forces us to honestly reveal our true Nature of Self.”
In the subtly of “Love Song,” he fashions love to “a song that lingers longer – like music in the soul; one that soothes our longing for touch from another being.”
And after contemplating the beauty of nature, he offers a clue to the essence love. It’s transcendental, yet pedestrian – ineffable, yet understandable. Weston pens in the “Language of Love,” “If I were a red rose blooming in a French garden, I would say study me well. Learn the vocabulary of my structure…observe the sensuality of my curves, touch my petals! See how soft and sensuous – foreign, yet familiar.”
But in “Love Sing,” the poet bemoans the burden of love. There is yearning, pleading and pain. But he battles through raw emotions hoping to temper, if not conquer his feelings.
In “Moment” the “Hyde” side of Love rears its head and the poet is shattered, crestfallen, victim of unspeakable despair. Love proves to be a double-edge sword. And Weston cries out, “Does there exist a remedy potent enough to speed relief? Or counteract the sting of unrequited love’s inconsolable grief? There is no magical formula capable of bringing instant relief.”
Weston’s ability as a genuine poet is best exemplified in “One River of Love.” He writes, “Love came like a magician in the night, re-arranging hearts that separately lie – like fading petals after summer roses die….Love is a bridge for strangers, two lives that melt into one river of self.”
Weston is boundlessly resourceful, arguably in the vein of the best: Byron, Keats and Wordsworth of the Romantic era. No small feat. His entire repertoire is dedicated to a single theme, a sure recipe for repetitiveness and ennui. Yet, he deftly avoids that pitfall, producing a number of poems, all of which are fresh, unique, and provocative. A triumph that is undeniable.
The Many Silences of Love: Contemporary Love Poems by H. Lloyd Weston (2nd edition, 2012)
Trafford Publishers, USA
ISBN: 978-1-4269-4488-8
Available: www.trafford.com
Rating: Recommended
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