Review: Winter Sharp with Apples

When Opportunities for Growth Arise within Struggle
Review: Winter Sharp with Apples

​Jamie Roes
Annette Sisson
Poetry 
Terrapin Books, pp. 120 
Cost: $18.00

Human life mimics nature’s seasons and their complex tensions. Sometimes it is an easy and mild transition into a new phase. Other times, it is a violent and distinct change that leaves one feeling ill prepared and unsettled. More commonly, it is a slow transition filled with inconsistency and wavering.

​Annette Sisson skillfully weaves the complexities of grief throughout her poetry collection, Winter Sharp with Apples. The book’s title is a reminder that even in bitter times, such as a sharp winter, life will present moments of hope and sweetness, as depicted through the image of the apple. 

“Origin Story,” the first poem in the book, eloquently depicts the narrator lying on “a frayed quilt in a back acre” as she observes the serene nature around her (line 1). The narrator is trying to stay within nature but has to continually recenter herself because she is imprisoned by her dark and sad thoughts. She writes, “To still the swirl, I focus / on the febrile moon, sense its contours of despair, / ecstasy” (lines 8-10). 

​Sisson’s use of alliteration forces the reader to sit within the words in order to truly appreciate their depth. The poem clearly depicts the concept of how being stuck in one’s own thoughts can impact situations and what is around them. It is a reminder that consciously centering oneself within nature can bring inner peace and calmness.

​While some of Sisson’s poems discuss the disconnect between grieving thoughts and the beauty of nature, other poems celebrate how nature and grief are deeply intertwined. In the poem, “Death is not” the narrator is processing the saddest and hardest moments of grief surrounding the death of her mother; the unsettling feelings of the unknown. The poem discusses how bodies will become one with the soil of the earth and turn into new parts of nature. Line 23 asks, “What of their glistening threads?” The narrator connects how death is threaded into the cycles of nature and finds peace within that realization. 

Just as nature’s cycles repeat themselves, Sisson also uses the repetition of words in some of her poems. She skillfully plays with their varying meanings and ties some of life’s most important moments together with nature while creating crisp visuals for her readers. “Nature Almost Holds Us,” uses the word “flap” in a myriad of ways and causes the reader to assess the value of such a seemingly simple word. Flap is used to discuss happiness, worry, movement, confusion, and a covering of material. In this poem, flap references a baby ultrasound, leaves blaze and flap in morning air, bird’s whoosh and flap, and finally, a flap in her father’s cognitive ability. Flaps of material open and close and it feels as though this poem is describing brief moments in the narrator’s life. Visually, it felt as though the reader opened a door into a scene of someone’s life, watched for a few moments, and then closed the door and moved onto the next door to repeat the same. 

Similarly, Sisson repeatedly uses the words “morning,” typically associated with newness and promise, and “mourning,” typically associated with grief, sadness, and loss. It is an interesting juxtaposition but when Sisson intermixes them, the reader is left with the ability to see how both are important parts in the grieving process. In her poem “First Morning, 2023,” Sisson writes:

Blue-gray hills convene
in haze, and patches of bare
brush congregate on nearby
slopes, ringed in white
light. Already morning
kindles spent embers,
marrow of bone and earth (lines 7-13)

The scene’s imagery calls attention to the promise and opportunity of a new day, yet the next line in the stanza addresses a fire already burned out; an ending. The last line of the poem reminds the reader that beginnings and endings are necessary and frequent occurrences within humans and nature.

One of the longer poems in the collection, “Caney Fork,” references the book’s title in the poem’s last line. The poem attacks the proverbial fork in the road: one character can move forward and one cannot after the death of her mother. Sisson addresses the sense of anxiety that loss creates: “I picture the wire thickening / To rope, me pulling your body, / hand over hand, back to shore” (lines 39 - 41).

The poem is layered in sensory imagery: the beautiful and colorful fall leaves and the serene waters of the river. These are markedly different from the grief that the narrator is feeling. The last line, “a winter sharp with apples” addresses how even among beauty, there can be grave feelings of sadness and loss. It points to the idea that while a person’s life has been greatly impacted, the rest of the world continues to move on, unaffected. 

Her book is a true testament to her talent within her craft. Sisson highlights the painful and unsystematic process of grieving. Her poems emphasize how differently grief feels at varying stages and how it is not a linear process but rather an ebb and flow of emotions and progress. Sisson creatively dares her readers to relent to the uncontrollable changes that loss brings and embrace feelings that are raw and unavoidable. The difficult and heavy topic is encapsulated by descriptive language about nature and the potential for regrowth offered by being within nature. There is hope in the promise that normal life is waiting for us even amidst grief and even if we are not ready to receive it yet.