Reading Simply Being Tonight…

—My reflective recommendation included in this post 🙂

from February 6, 2023

I began the day in the morning when I woke with one session of a new painting, with a new very portable table easel, given to me by my mom for Christmas. I like to sit and paint, and this is so easy to set up and have plenty of room for supplies.

The day is coming to night after the short paint session and much housework (as often how a day is), and now I read this poetry book…Simply Being by Roula Maria Dib, the chief editor of Indelible Magazine, and she also hosts PsychCreative on Zoom and creative conferences in London on her social media.

The book was on my Wishlist, and given to me by my sister and her husband for a late Christmas celebration in New York, and I am just in the mood to read the book of poems.

These poems feel good, and they have a complexity of phrases containing a blend of dream images and fine art paintings that are just wonderful to read and to read one poem more than once! This is an evening time break of activity at the falling of the day for unwinding and lounging in slow reading. It is intellectual thinking and also mindful meditation:

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My reflective recommendation of Simply Being by Roula Maria Dib:

I simply love this book of poetry! Even with the last section stated as written during the 2020 pandemic, these poems are so brilliant, vivacious, and embrace life. What I especially love is the subtle use of meter in the poems while being free with language and eloquent at the same time. I love how Roula plays with word choice to create more layers of meaning, and includes culture and mythology, which at times brings plenty of simple narrative, and at times placing in a word or phrase from other languages, like Latin, that are easily understood in context with the English written poetry.

This book had been on my Wishlist, and I was so happy to add it to my poetry section of my home library, as a gift. I find her dream poems are so real and evocative, coming forward so naturally, and also of course, her poems that celebrate foods and the link from them to gatherings with her family.

These are not “sugar-coated” poems, but are very scrumptious in their varieties of flavors and ideas. The Afterword by the author is also very encouraging and interesting, along with the introduction written by author Omar Sabbagh, which in a similar richness of language, introduces readers to the main aspects of this collection, giving a little literary insight and wise appreciation. I would definitely recommend this collection.

Click this post to read my own personal poetic connection with the book.