What can I say about Alice Walker? I know only a little about her (the culmination of my knowledge being that she once worked at Ms. magazine, has Lyme disease, and wrote the Pulitzer-Prize winning novel, The Color Purple [1982]). I am not going to pretend to be an expert on Alice Walker, someone who has read and reread everything she s published.

In fact, Absolute Trust in the Goodness of the Earth [2003] is the first book by Alice Walker that I have read. I have never read any other poems of hers; I can only assume that her poetry has changed and developed over the years and that this collection should not be taken as a definitive standard. But, taking this book as my guideline, I must say that Alice Walker is not America s most brilliant and creative living poet.

I would hate to use the word sham to refer to this poetry collection, but there are very few words that come close to describing the feeling you have when you read this book. It is not very well written (with sentences like Your tush, seen bottomless, / Is like a small, / Undefended / Country / In which is grown / Yellow / Melons ). Walker claims, in the preface, that Each morning, after sitting for half an hour, I wrote several poems. If that statement is true, it may explain how poorly written some of the verse is, almost as if it was written in one slapdash attempt with no revision or editing. This may explain the run-on sentences and forced rhymes. Some of the poems have traces of good work and good poetry, but they are outweighed by those which lack depth, style, or creativity. They are not unlike the poems a sixteen-year-old girl would write in her diary unpolished and somewhat self-absorbed not the work of a Pulitzer-Prize-winning author.

It seems that Alice Walker s most recent books, including this one, have been greeted with a cold critical reception. The New York Times review of Walker s Now is the Time to Open Your Heart [2004] stated, If this novel did not boast the name of Alice Walker it s hard to imagine how it could have been published. I must say that I feel the same could be said for this book. If not for the acclaim of The Color Purple, this book would have been rejected and locked away in a desk drawer. Whether or not this would have been a better fate for Ms. Walker and her readers, who knows? It is not for me to say.

If you enjoy the works of Alice Walker, you may or may not like this book. If you do not care for her, you will not like this book. My suggestion would be that if you wish to read this book, you should save your money and borrow it from your local library.

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