My Goodreads review: Dark Roads

Dark Roads: Selected Long Poems 1971-2012 by Bruce Boston

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


This is an essential collection for readers & collectors of speculative poetry. It offers a varied selection of Rhysling Grandmaster Bruce Boston's longer dark poems (1971-2012), in chronological order. Several works from his ongoing Mutant Rain Forest series are included, along with works ranging from straight-ahead SF narrative to experimental/surreal visions. The book's trade paperback format is carefully designed, with a few elegant black & white illos by M. Wayne Miller.

My personal favorites in this generously-sized collection (over 150 pp.) were the heartbreakingly lovely "She Was There for Him the Last Time," "Pavane for a Cyber-Princess," "Dark Rains Here and There," and all the Mutant Rain Forest works. I have never quite managed to get my head around the surreal, though Boston's version of it makes some incredible mind-pictures.

Boston's language is both kaleidoscopic & precise, and his narratives take the imagination places reality simply doesn't allow for. The works in this collection reward multiple readings -- as all good poetry does.





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