Critical Commentary
This critical commentary is from (the Beat Poet Laureate of New Mexico) PW Covington’s blurb on the back of my second chapbook:
From the first page of this collection, Donnie Hollingsworth sets the pace with a rockabilly rhythm, unwavering and direct. It is clear that we are in for a ride behind the veils and complacency of popular identity.
The voice here is direct, without being brutal; it is truth defined through perspective. In turns, these poems reveal a psychedelic glow, only perceptible alone and in the dark.
Some mountain cultures of the southwest consider the owl dark and powerful medicine.
October beer, October ink, into February snow, that medicine remains in your system with each poem, The poetry pulls us through semesters and into each new oblivion.
Hollingsworth presents us snapshots far from final – the poet teases and contorts time itself trying to get us to see through their skin, to understand the angle they find themselves set at against the seasons.
There is an ever-shifting point of voice that travels with these poems – and it is that curious clarity I found most engaging as a reader, especially in its many returns to the inevitable questions, that come in waves and pulses…questions addressed if not answered, never finished, by the ever-singing poetry of OM.
