Review – No Matter How Dark The Stain by Andrea L. Wehlann

The synopsis of this poetry anthology No Matter How Dark the Stain by Andrea L. Wehlann caught my eye, with the subject matter and structure of the book of particular interest.

The synopis paraphrased state, No Matter How Dark the Stain is presented in three sections:

• Poems of love, innocence, and poems of hope from the time before loss, grief, and trauma

• Grieving poems for the loss of a child, and poetry about abuse and trauma

• Poems of getting over grief, healing poems, poems of hope and gratitude, poems of love, especially self-love.

Poetry isn’t my first choices in reading, but I enjoy the genre and usually understand what I’m reading including subtext and nuance. Suffice to say, I’m no expert, couldn’t detail the technicalities, but I generally ‘get’ what is being conveyed. I found No Matter How Dark the Stain to be quite different to what I expected. It was less like poetry and more like a stream of consciousness separated into various topics.

It was fleeting thoughts, almost like diary entries of a stranger you had no common interests with . Regardless, some entries I appreciated more that others, some did not resonate at all, while others left me questioning what I had read. Personally one of my issues with this book is on how it should be read. There are too many poems and reading them back to back is not the way, even over the course of several weeks.

However, there isn’t a detailed enough guide for you to dip into the book and pick out the mood that you want to dwell in.

In conclusion, I found that there wasn’t any standout terms, imagery or resultant emotions. It didn’t evoke a depth of feeling which I anticipated given the subject matter or the hope and healing indicated. I left each poem with a sense of experiencing… not much, not even disappointment.

My thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for a digital copy of this book to review.