Spring Delusions by Zahra Ammar – Book Review

Words are our only tools to express the physicality of the chaos in our minds.

It is tedious and painstaking process to create something, anything. Emotions are not words, hence, to put them as such, requires quite a bit of searching, meandering and stumbling. I believe my affair with these alphabets will never be satiated. Yet, I have tried to sing some broken tunes, sketched some bleakness and shared fragments of my inner hope.

I have often had a love hate relationship with poetry. Its enigmatic power has often left me confused but also enlightened me. Although rhymes are fun and easy to tap your foot to, it is the rhythm or sometimes, the lack of it that can truly sear through the heart. For me, simplicity is key. It is graceful. It is alluring.

Each poem is handwritten, followed by typewrite for easy bookmarking and commenting and is accompanied by an illustration, meticulously and thoughtfully crafted. I refuse to acknowledge that illustrations are for children’s books only. There is no age limit to vision. Seeing is as much a part of feeling as reading and imagining is. I hope you enjoy them as much as I have in making them.

The poems I write do not follow any rule in particular. Although well-versed in writing verses, I opt to experiment with a variety of things, from alliteration to repetitions, and rhyme to meters, and mirroring to collating. Some poems have written themselves. Some, I have agonized over for days and nights. Writing and rewriting, getting it just right and then starting all over again. It is an organized pandemonium of the human self.

Spring Delusions is a short poetry book written by Zahra Ammar. I can honestly say that a poetry book isn’t something I would normally choose to read. I have often found that I don’t always understand where the poet is trying to go with their thoughts, but I didn’t have this issue with these poems.

The book is quite unusual in that it also contains drawings by the author. Each picture represents a poem. At the end of the book the author has also included her handwritten copies of her poems. I actually feel that these would of work better in the main of the book instead of the text, as they gave a more personal feeling to Zahra’s poetry.

Spring Delusions is a lovely collection of poems that you can tell have come straight from the author’s heart, as she has put so much feeling into them. I was surprised by how much I actually enjoy reading them.

Zahra Ammar holds an MA in English with a penchant for economics, food and creativity. An author and a poet, she is also a teacher and a learner, a procrastinator and a creative mess. She has been passionately teaching High School English and Economics for the past eight years, and reads voraciously whenever awake.

She is also into calligraphy and doodles and spends her time exploring and questioning the rare and the mundane.

A Keats at heart, a Whitman in expression, a Dickenson in style and enamored by Rumi, she follows no one but her own voice.

www.zahraammar.wordpress.com