The Porcupine of the Mind
Katerina Stoykova-Klemer is a Renaissance woman both on and off the page. After immigrating to America from Bulgaria in 1995, she worked as a software engineer, and then earned a Master of Fine Arts degree in poetry at Spalding University in Louisville in 2009, at which point she began a new, multifaceted career as an editor, publisher, educator, radio personality, community leader and poet. Klemer uniquely melds Bulgarian and American language and culture in her poems, which is no easy feat. However, like all other difficult themes in her work, she honestly confronts both the personal and poetic struggles and joys of writing poetry (and living) in two languages—“They say the tongue you become a poet in is the one which can never tell a lie.”
It is this multicultural and bilingual aspect of her verses that gives the poet her singular voice and style. The Porcupine of Mind is an assortment of poems that transform simple muses—suitcase, lullaby, snowman, Hula-Hoop, sobriety—into profound and imaginative philosophies: “How did you get to be so beautiful? I asked the word cynical. How did you get to be so stupid? she answered.”
Moreover, the collection is filled with aesthetically intricate poems, many displaying a level of playful curiosity and whimsy while also remaining buoyant in their metaphysical musings—“The broken-off handle of the drawer is in the drawer.” Most interesting is Klemer’s ability to anthropomorphize inorganic objects until they converse and prophesy on topics that hold the most depth and significance to humans. One example is a poem about a row of candles in a store window that prompts the poet to ask, “Which one of you skinny ladies wants to burn in the name of love?” Many of the poems in The Porcupine of Mind are concerned with the locked door beneath the skull, so much so that the collection manifests itself as a profound exploration of the human psyche, how it processes love, friendship, guilt and regret. Klemer cleverly cautions “it’s dark out,” but “curious things can be found” in the labyrinth of her poetry, if readers dare “to go there.”
The Porcupine of Mind
By Katerina Stoykova-Klemer
Broadstone Books
$14.50 (P)