I typically enjoy poetry collections though some can be a miss rather than a hit. "Three Poems" by Hannah Sullivan is definitely one of them. It has some enjoyable reads but some do fall a bit flat.

The three poems in this collection are lengthy and each describe a different aspect of life: “You, Very Young in New York” is exactly what it sounds like. A poem in second person describing what the person is like at that stage in their life. It is followed by "“Repeat until Time,” also in second person, where the subject moves to California and the poem touches on what is left behind. Finally there is "The Sandpit after Rain,” where the death of the speaker's father coincides with the birth of her son.

It was my first experience reading Sullivan's work and I appreciated the poems, even if they are not my usual fare.

I don't particularly enjoy this kind of poetry, but they're not bad. It's more of a me problem than any particular problem with the work itself.

Reading poetry requires a particular type of reading muscle. Hannah Sullivan's Three Poems definitely reminded me how out of shape mine is! That said, her word and structure choice was such that every line was clearly intentional, even if I didn't always understand what she was trying to do. Long form poetry has never been my favorite, but each is written to be consumed in smaller chunks, which was a blessing.

A mother myself, I particular liked and related to her third poem, The Sandpit After Rain. Just the title of the poem evokes a very specific image, and the way she juxtaposes the late term birth of her hefty baby (the same experience I had with my first) with the death of her father is especially effective. I also appreciated how she applied art to science, especially in Repeat Until Time. Part 4.4 of the poem recounts the first atomic bomb test; the event on it's own it's a significant scientific "achievement" but under her pen, Sullivan exposes both the horrible beauty and ominous nature of the event.

If you are a fan of "high poetry," which is how I would describe this collection, I think there is a lot here to satisfy you. If, however, you prefer more straightforward verse, this might be one to pass over.

This books of poetry is a challenge to assess because of the unique writing style, which is one of the draws of poetry. The poems are for readers that yearn to be apart of the Brooklyn Millenial cultural. Sullivan provides vivid, gritty descriptions of everyday life in New York.

This collection of poems, three in total, are for readers that want to be immersed in setting descriptions and interactions, as well as, readers that want a close-up lens for the oddities of life in New York for young people.

Three Poems by Hannah Sullivan is the poet's first collection of poetry and the winner of the 2018 T.S. Eliot Prize. Sullivan is a British academic and poet. She is the author of The Work of Revision, which won the Rose Mary Crawshay Prize and the University English Book Prize.

It is extremely refreshing to see the return of long poems:  a detailed, flowing, narrative, that captures the reader and holds them in sort of a reading trance.  Words and thoughts flowing through the reader's mind and occasionally hitting even a higher-level awareness.  The lines connect in complex images and emotions. The reader will realize that this is what poetry should be -- full, rich, and rewarding.  It is not the easy "poetry" of Instagram.  This is for the mind.

Three Poems is exactly what the title describes.  There is the innocent beginning in New York City followed by an adult period in California a period of repeating and patterns.  The final poem cycles the reader back to a time that is the next step in life but also to create a new person to start the cycle again.  Childbirth and death of a parent in this section complete the cycle of life,  The acts are the same, but the people change.  One cannot go back in time, but having a child is much the same as giving youth back, but not directly to yourself.

I can appreciate the New York City opening and life in an east coast big city.  It is the city of immigrants beginning a new life, the beginning of style and music that others will soon follow. It is the excitement of youth -- "He makes it for the girl in leathers with a face like the Virgin Mary." and "Her fingers smelled of Camel Lights and lavender, and she is laughing."  In California, the setting changes -- "Days may be where we live, but mornings are eternity.  They wake us, and every day waking is absurdity; all the things you just did yesterday to do over again."  We become a cog in the system and will make cracks about the hipsters (who a few years ago would have been us).  Finally, as a parent, we see our earlier life in the child's future.  We witness the circle.  A decade and a half older than the poet I can easily relate to the scenes and settings of life that she experienced. Perhaps, that just goes to support the idea that we all travel the same cycle but at different times.

It caught my eye that this collection was awarded the T.S. Eliot Prize for poetry in the UK & Ireland. My curiosity and interest are often aroused by the fact that a book has been considered award-worthy in one way or another, so it's certainly possible that I was pre-disposed to respond favorably to Three Poems by Hannah Sullivan. Whether I was unduly influenced by this or not, it's true that I enjoyed reading the book and and was impressed by the talent and imagination of the poet, a young woman who currently teaches at Oxford.

Poetry collections that seem to follow a narrative thread that keeps my mind in a developing story are always among my favorites to read. Sullivan tells three stories in her three poems, and keeps me invested in each by frequently surprising/delighting me with pictures I was not expecting to see and incidents I haven't encountered before. Upon reaching the end of the book, I went back and read this one a second time.

Geez. I wish this was only 3 words long. smh
I could not in any way connect with these poems, which made me sad cause I really wanted to like it.

Sullivan's third poem about life and death, dealing with her father's death and the birth of her son is my favorite. Her sorrow comes through strong and the birth scene is grounded in some humor. Her first poem, "You, Very Young in New York" is meant to be a generalized experience drawn from her personal life, but it felt trite with the White Woman Transplant In New York City-ish. Still, I enjoyed her voice throughout the short book and will look forward to future releases.

The first three quarters of this collection was absolutely beautiful and I was really interested in the writing. But, as the collection continued and I reached the last section of it I became very confused. I felt as if it was just a bunch of words put together to mean something but, that underlying meaning wasn’t able to be comprehended by the reader. Sadly this made me super confused and made it to where I didn’t enjoy the collection as much & was kind of let down in the end.

Ms. Hannah Sullivan's debut poetry collection, "Three Poems," reads like an ongoing journal of poetry through life's experiences. Each day and encounter adds another stanza to her open-ended epics.

Her opening poem, “You, Very Young in New York” is a cynical commentary on New York City and youth that focuses on a young person who was looking for something when she arrived and found something completely different. It captures the experience of living in a big city with its familiar haunts. The poem feels like a long run-on sentence. There are many different subjects and places and experiences Sullivan describes, which despite being in one poem, seem disconnected. She moves from sights around town, to work, to a sexual encounter, without any rhyme or reason or flow. Then back on the subway. Maybe that is the point. That the subject feels nothing and passes from one place to an encounter and then onto something else almost like a zombie.

The second poem, "Repeat Until Time: The Heraclitus Poem" dissects various images that like her opening poem seem disconnected and random. In the first section the poem is about wading in floodwaters, the next is about dancing to wedding music. The images are very description and include a lot of imagery, but the meaning is lost on the constantly changing subjects.

The final poem offers a more concrete image to focus on. It describes the weeks of pregnancy, then a c-section at the hospital, and finally holding a newborn baby. The sad part is how she overlays her pregnancy and birth of a child with the death of her father.

Overall, Ms. Sullivan has some profoundly deep poems here with great personal meaning. It is a fascinating collection of works. However, for me I had trouble connecting with them.

I received this as an eBook from Farrar, Straus and Giroux via NetGalley in exchange for an honest and unbiased review of the title. I did not receive any compensation from either company. The opinions expressed herein are completely my own.