Beth Copeland

Transcendental Telemarketer Beth Copeland

Poetry. Copeland's TRANSCENDENTAL TELEMARKETER contains beautiful lyrics of emotion and meditation, but it also contains rants against war and violence, and all the while it swings us from the U. S. to Japan to Afghanistan, from Islam to Buddhism to Christianity It's compelling, playful, and well-crafted.--William Allegrezza

Beth Copeland's poems are music. She combines powerful alliteration ('following blue rivers of blood / flowing back to the heart') with unobtrusive rhyme ('silver wolves / howl, owls hoot'). Occasional use of form seems to grow from the poem. Asia influences Copeland's writing; as in Japanese poetry, nature imagery becomes philosophy. Fresh juxtapositions 'explode like poppies from the barrels of guns.' Color commands our vision: 'the violet wave of light around the Japanese iris.' We hear, mystically, 'the Earth's vibrations / converge in a single note.' Read this book several times--each visit will uncover a different layer.--Anne-Adele Wight

Beth Copeland's TRANSCENDENTAL TELEMARKETER lifts language beyond its typical meanings, lets it 'whirl like a spinning top set loose on the sidewalk, ' until language and meaning split--the way the 'I' does in the poems -- 'I break in two: one girl stays on the bed while the other one floats to the ceiling to watch.' With rare prowess, Copeland crafts these poems, delivering 'the equator in that Ouija world, ' 'death' as a 'potent aphrodisiac.'--Debrah Morkun