This Moment's Marrow (Ecca Poets 2017). A Reader's Impression
​Review by Rene Bohnen
(Extracts on Norman Morrissey and Silke Heiss)

What is marrow? This question spontaneously pops up as I hold the 2017 publication of the Ecca Poets – their 20th book in 25 years. This edition, This Moment’s Marrow, offers the reader  an eclectic group of poets in an anthology which makes for an enriching read.
 
So what is marrow? Dictionaries present definitions we know so well that we probably seldom pause to think about the profound meaning of the word. Marrow is “a soft fatty substance in the cavities of bones” the internet offers, and also “ the essential part of something”.  Synonyms given are: “essence, core, pith” and “heart”.
 
In the reading of This Moment’s Marrow,  I discover and experience the whole spectrum of these dictionary entries.
 
The anthology title is taken from a Norman Morrissey poem on page 26.
​
Grasp
 
A dove called,
and I’d a vision
of our lithe boomslang
 
up in the cherry tree:
the Holy Ghost
and the hero
 
winding Hippocrates’ staff of healing
in one grasp
of thought:
 
old myths, symbols
lurking
in this moment’s marrow.
 
All of the Morrissey poems in this anthology show an accomplished poet at his task. Strong pastoral imagery, bursting with life, alternates with delicate vignettes of tenderness and tranquil silence.
 
Norman Morrissey passed away in July 2017 and has left a rich literary legacy. Like the butterfly shows us the breeze, this poet shows us wisdom. (Page 24)
 
            Breeze
 
You knew there was a breeze
only
because the butterflies
 
danced
in
it! 
 
According to the Preface, the poets have had “no real aspirations or manifestos” and their books will hopefully always have “a workshop feel” (Brian Walter on page 1)
 
If the function of marrow is to generate blood cells, the vital role of Ecca get-togethers is evident. Nurturing and giving oxygen, the group promotes growth in individual poets. All have successfully made their own paths as well – since paths are made by walking, as the Spanish poet Antonio Machado so succinctly put it.
 
[...]
 
Children and babies feed the marrow of a mother’s soul, as they do that of the poet. 
 
            When I fell
            pregnant
            with you I fell
 
            into new makings,
            poems would wake me”
 
writes Silke Heiss in “Kept up” on page 27.  She is a poet who understands the exquisite tension that is created by holding two polarities at once. I give you the example on page 29, where a surprising contradiction alerts the reader to a vast truth held within a small poem:
 
            Mist    
 
Mist is
a revelation,
a happy Gossip –
 
tells all
where air has been –
is going to.
 
Almost haiku-like, the short poems sigh with insight and meaning; they show Heiss to be a master of cutting right to the essence of her observation. In her longer poems, she displays an instinctive grasp of the objective correlative, by evoking strong emotion in the reader without annoying prescription. On page 29 we find the
 
            Wood Owl
 
            I go outside to fetch some kindling,
            my blankets snag on branches dry –
            unwitting I catch them with the twigs I’m breaking:
            they whirr and cough and patter and sigh.
 
            Panic I subdue with patience,
            pull away gently, sensing why.
            Free at last I fill the box,
            but am lost in the dark by the Wood owl’s cry.

- Rene Bohnen, January 2019
The entire review will shortly be available on eccapoets.blogspot.com/p/reviews-and-commentary.html​

7 books of love poems by Norman Morrissey and Silke Heiss
​Review by Cathy Dippnall 

​Review of seven books of love poems: Tryst, Learn the Dance, Simply in Love; To the Far Horizon; Love Letters to the Earth; A Shell Held to the Ear and the final book, The Only Altar, published after Norman’s untimely death.
 
To say I was moved is an understatement. I attended Silke’s readings of the last book, The Only Altar with some trepidation after receiving the books to review and an invitation to a reading in Simon’s Town earlier this year. How was I going to cope, listening to poems from a beautiful woman poet whose beloved soul mate and husband has died?
 
Silke held herself perfectly, read with passion, simplicity and love. It was I who received the jolt. These poems could have been about my life, my soulmate, right down to the ill health, watching your loved one struggling and in pain, joy in the mundane, gratefulness.
 
These were my immediate thoughts after the reading of The Only Altar, which I penned in a notebook, ‘Your poems (Silke and Norman) opened up my innermost parts where deep down the language of love, life and death mingle and intertwine. Here, a key has been turned, there is a light leading the way out.’
 
After reading the first five books again I can finally put pen to paper, not because I dislike them, quite the opposite; the poetry reaches my inner core and I’ve had to reach right in and acknowledge so much that is similar.
 
The poetry in these books are of two adults, broken, hurt individuals who discover raw, all-empowering love with a soul mate. who could have been a long-lost lover in a former life. They are besotted, like young lovers exploring their bodies and powerful sexual urges. The beauty of mature love is that these lovers find perfection in each other where others would see age, wrinkles and gnarled hands.
 
Once the first stage of love and romance is over it chrysalises into a new love, of respect, tolerance and trust. Self-doubts are assuaged in their desires that bind them together and in Silke’s words in Late Harvest “… in our ripeness we are each other’s final dawning – a late harvest’s sweetness has more rising suns than any other.”
 
The poets and lovers find beauty in each other and all around them amidst the feelings of angst at Norman’s failing health. Each is absorbed by the other, to the end Norman sees Silke’s beautiful frail body (that has grown smaller as his health dwindles) as delicate and bud-like.
 
Time is of the essence, Silke and Norman make the most of each day, sitting and writing to each other or sms’ing when they are not together. The love tryst carries on far beyond the reach of a mortal body. The soul is ever present, talking in the wind, the sky, the earth, the butterfly landing on a rose.
 
True love never ends.

– Cathy Dippnall, writer and editor, 12th November 2018