This is an intro to Maggie Smith and I liked it. She makes me reflect on life and what i am doing with it. She has a way with words and how to portray difficult emotions but her poetry captures that perfectly. Excited to see what else she comes out with.

Maggie Smith has such a beautiful way of sharing feelings and scenes that seem so specific and yet are universal. I love the way she sees the world and these poems felt plucked from my own heart.

This collection explores the connection between mind and body, and the different versions of a person throughout the eras of a life. It's reflective and contemplative, and makes you ruminate on the meaning of the life we're leading, in this moment and the next, and then whatever might come after.

My favourite poem was Time-Stamped:

Time-Stamped

There is a revision of me that lives
in the future, watching me from the future,

which makes me a prototype,
an earlier version, the one she thinks of now.

She looks back at me and at the life
I live in the house she must think of

as 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘰𝘭𝘥 𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘴𝘦, and at my children—
her children-still lap-small

and sticky-cheeked. She watches us
the way I watch old, time-stamped versions

of myself, the roughest drafts, feeling
I'd slit a stranger's throat for the clean slate

that was mine—the slate I wanted
only to write and write on.

She watches from the future
to remind me I am not finished,

not as fleshed out as I feel.
I must be full of blanks she'll know

how to fill, and she'll fill them.
She looks back at me, and someone

looks back at her, and I am watching
every version of myself behind me:

never overridden or replaced
but saved, each of us saved.

I’ve enjoyed all of Maggie Smith’s collections, but A SUIT OR A SUITCASE moved me especially. Is it because I’m in a similar phase of mothering/womanhood as Smith? Maybe. But I found her poems about how we define and redefine selfhood to be emotionally resonant in a way that gripped me. I plan to revisit this collection again and again, and I’m sure I’ll find more to ponder when I do.

what a brilliant collection of poetry. i've read and loved maggie smith's poetry over the years, so i suppose it's no surprise that i liked this one. i'm especially fond of the poems, "Self Portrait as an Incomplete List of Mysteries," and "Homebody," and overall i loved the way this collection pondered on the body, how you're tethered to and by this flesh suit but you carry it all the same--a suit or a suitcase, then? i want a copy for myself for rereads every now and then, it's that good, it's reread-worthy. thank you to netgalley and publisher for giving access to an eARC in exchange for an honest review!!

Poetry was my very first love as a reader, and A Suit or a Suitcase reminded me exactly why. I’m particular about the poets I connect with, but Maggie Smith’s voice and flow captured me right away.

Certain pieces; The Score, Window Seat, Time-Stamped, and the title poem especially, stopped me in my tracks. The way Smith captures fleeting moments, and the bittersweet emotions inside them, made me want to underline line after line. This is the kind of collection that you return to and discover something new each time.

Beyond the words, the cover itself is a piece of art that perfectly reflects what’s inside: poetry that is both grounded and luminous.

I’ll be revisiting this one often, and I already can’t wait to explore more of Maggie Smith’s work. Highly recommended for anyone who loves poetry that feels intimate, sharp, and deeply human.

I truly cannot get over how gorgeous this book cover is. Definitely a huge deciding factor in me requesting.
I don’t know how to rate poetry, so instead, here’s a few of my favorites:
- The Score
- Vision (only bc I am reading this on my phone in the dark in bed when I should be sleeping and I too open and close each eye to watch my vision shift back and forth)
- Self portraits as an incomplete list of mysteries
- Three thoughts after crossing nameless creek

A Suit or a Suitcase by Maggie Smith was such a beautiful collection of poetry and I'm so glad I got the opportunity to read an e-arc of it. I loved the themes covered and I cannot wait to recommend this book to people looking to try out poetry. The poetry is quite accessible to everyone and I thought it added to the beauty of the poetry. Maggie Smith is a genius!

Wow, what a collection of poems. I actually read most of them more than once because they were just incredible. The mind, the body, the memories we look back on.

These poems really resinated with me, the type of thoughts that come late at night, when there’s no noise to disturb your feel thoughts.

It makes you wonder, what is life? The decisions we make, the lives we live, does it truly matter in the grand scheme of things? We look back at our memories and reminisce on the past. What about the future? What about at the end of everything?

Maggie Smith created a wonderful, mind-opening collection.

Thank you NetGalley and Atria Books for this ARC.

A unique collection of thought-provoking poetry that enhances and encourages reflection and exploration of one’s own mind and body.

My thanks to NetGalley, Maggie Smith, and the publisher for an advanced copy in exchange for my honest opinion.
4 Stars.

My thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this early review copy.

Maggie Smith asks:  How do you experience the world?  How do I experience the world? Do you experience it with your mind, or your body?  Is your body a suit you wear, or a suitcase that carries you?  Do we experience the same world?

She asks, and she answers.

These poems will be accessible to everyone, but perhaps will resonate most strongly with those at mid-life, with half a lifetime to look back on and half a lifetime possibly yet ahead.

Here is a fragment from her "Self Portrait as an Incomplete List of Mysteries"
<blockquote><i>How I’m the same person I was at seven, at seventeen, at twenty-seven, at thirty-seven, and now, and how I’m not the same at all, not copy-pasted year to year to year. 

What rodeo I’m on. I’ve lost track of my rodeos. 

How some things that are true do not stay true. The trueness wears off, like gold</i></blockquote>

This volume, like Smith’s earlier works, is chock full of random and oddly relatable thoughts, such as (from "Three Thoughts After Crossing Nameless Creek"):
<blockquote><i> Once, as a child, you tried to imagine 
nothing—tried like hell to empty 
your mind’s shameful hoard. 
But each time you had it, 
you labeled it—nothing— 
and that was something, 
and you had to start again.</i></blockquote>

Yes! That has happened to me, too! It is impossible for me to truly empty my mind, but I’ve tried.  And it’s reassuring to know I’m not alone, neither in the trying nor in the failing. 

And there’s that odd sense of displacement and confusion when you step out of a museum (or a movie or okay, anything transporting) and you’re faced with plain old real life again, from "Installation":
<blockquote><i>When you leave the museum 
of contemporary art, opening 
the doors to midday, you may need 
a few minutes to reset context: 
the bike shackled to the sign 
is only a bike, the sign only a sign, 
no small white exhibit labels. … </i></blockquote>

She goes on to point out the exquisite beauty of the quotidian world that isn't always acknowledged, “as if sunlight as sunlight isn’t enough.”  Often the value of an art museum exhibit is to make us stop and really look at what we see every day.  It seems obvious, but we all need that reminder.

And I think that’s what the best poetry is, it’s reassurance that all those crazy thoughts inside your head have been thought by other people, too.  

I felt like I needed to include quotes, but please note I read an ARC and it's possible some small changes will be made before publication.

Thank you so much to NetGalley and Maggie Smith for the E-ARC. This collection of poems is so wonderfully short. And I mean literally, like every poem takes 2 minutes or less to read. If you’re like me and maybe have nothing else to do on this particular day, maybe you’ll chose to devour this in a solid sitting. This is exactly what I did and maybe I’m at fault for this because now, weeks later, I don’t remember much from the collection but maybe it wasn’t as impactful as I would have hoped. There’s also this artful ambiguity to poetry that makes it hard to rate and remember fully. This said, it is very beautifully written with a main theme about the body as a vessel for your soul to experience the world. And to notice the mundane and find the good.
If you are to read this, please read it slowly with intention because it is a lovely collection of reminders as we move through this physical world.
“The energy worker tells me
I’m not inside my body.
‘Then where am I?’”

Absolutely gorgeous reflective poetry collection that focuses on what one wants from life and identity.

I would like to thank the publisher for providing me with a arc.

I'm giving this a four star. even though it's about a 3.5. I liked it, and I read it till the end. But I didn't love it. A lot of the poems Almost felt clinical. And it was hard to decipher the metaphor from the truth. Making it difficult to separate the metaphor from the feeling. Like too much of it was wrapped up in pretty words, But there wasn't enough feeling behind it.
I would recommend it to other poets. Or people who like poetry. Each to their own.

Maggie Smith was born to be a poet. This was my first time reading any of her work and I am very impressed. I related to so many of the poems because I’m isolated right now and she spoke to my soul!! Amazing. Thank you to NetGalley, the publisher, and author for the change to read this for an honest review

I loved Maggie Smith's memoir and this is he first time I've read a collection of her poetry. I really enjoyed it and highly recommend!

A beautiful collection of poems. My favorite was the title poem. I look forward to buying a physical copy upon publication and rereading.

Thank you to Netgalley and Atria Books for a complimentary EArc in exchange for an honest review.

This collection of poetry has hit me in such a heavy feelings spot that I’m left speechless and full of wise words of life, motherhood, and a new sense of self.

There are so many highlights to look back on. I love this. So much.

Thank you to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for allowing me the opportunity to read this collection before publication. I’m truly honored.

Maggie Smith has a way of making me consider everyday experiences that make me better. Her words and ideas are gorgeous, and as I was reading, I kept making note of poems I'd love to use in my classroom. I can't wait to purchase a copy in March when it's officially published.

This book was an e-arc given by Netgalley in exchange for my own opinions.

The poems are well-written but for some reason didn't really leave a mark or have me thinking about them after reading them. Again, she's a skilled poet but as far as conveying a lasting emotion, it wasn't there for me.

I loved this collection of poetry by Maggie Smith. I felt very in tune with the poems presented and felt a connection with quite a few of them. The themes it deals with is real life struggles, identity, etc. They all resonated with me in some way or another and I really enjoyed sitting down to read this!