Winner of the 2003 Akron Poetry Prize<\/b><\/p>\n
Sharmila Voorakkara\u2019s family poems are tough-minded, sometimes angry, often elegiac, detailing the sad fate of her father who sells vacuum cleaners door to door, or serves as a night watchman, or takes up the holy life as an ascetic with begging bowl. An uncle takes a knife to his wife\u2019s face: \u201cWhat mirror didn\u2019t throw back the reminder \/ of what he could do if \/ he willed it?\u201d<\/p>\n
Don\u2019t look here for traditional lyricism. A transvestite, some circus freaks, a man splintering windshields with a baseball bat, a howling woman insane with grief salt and pepper this collection with Voorakkara\u2019s highly original tropes: \u201c[B]elieve me, \/ in the marble cathedrals of \/ spring lambs \/ we exist, \/ we amplify, we can\u2019t \/ be saved \/ from elation.\u201d And there is elation for the reader who encounters these highly unusual poems with their unexpected enjambments, street savvy diction, and a hard look at \u201cDangerous joy!\u201d<\/i>
\n\u2014Maxine Kumin<\/b><\/p>\n
In Sharmila Voorakkara\u2019s <\/i>Fire Wheel, we meet a cast of characters not so much deranged as charged with an energy and longing of scant use to them or the world. Hapless and haunted, anguished and angry, they dance from hope to despair. Whether they are an \u201cinvalid veteran, shawled \/ in the blue cathode of talk shows\u201d or a woman stranded by roadside, \u201chood thrown open \/ on a stupor of smoke as the car gives up \/ the ghost,\u201d their lives are lifted up by an empathic, passionate voice that lilts and warps. Stand back, from these pages a wild and beautiful singing bursts forth.<\/i>
\n\u2014Gregory Orr<\/b><\/p>\nAbout the author<\/h3>\n