A review of The Common Condition by Miriam Dale. Self-published in Australia by Miriam.

I love poetry for the same reason I love the psalms. They cut through my tendency to think too much and do too much. They reach through to the parts of me that I have covered up or ignored for too long.

What I find challenging is that there are people prepared to lay their lives bare like this. I might play with words and phrases, do some journaling, but I am mortified if others read them.

Miriam Dale is very courageous. She has been prepared to make public her deepest hurts and frustrations, and her laments. However, she has mixed it with humour, and self-deprecation, such that it never becomes too sad or intense.

For example, she personifies her emotions, and converses with them. I suspect there has never been another poem written to “Glum”, but don’t we all enjoy a little time with glum as long as we take the poem’s counsel:

I will not let you settle, or take up
Permanent residence, but
There is a time for everything
And now is the time for you.

I also suspect that not many people, when asking a poet to compose something for their wedding, would expect one written on the theme of “Courage”. We would much prefer saccharin celebrations of love rather than a reminder that courage is needed to remember,

You promised,
You promised,
You promised.
So you stay.

Another theme that resonates is Dale’s compassion for the vulnerable, and her willingness to demonstrate that with actions not just words. The poem “Hugs” describes three encounters with people on the fringes, where the sense is that she gained more from the encounters than she was able to give.

There is also a rant (in a healthy, constructive way) against the treatment of asylum seekers in the poem “More than Words”. However, that anger and frustration is ameliorated by her conviction that God is sovereign, and will show her the part she must play in his plan:

To heal, renew, turn-upside down
This hurtful, hateful
Beautiful
Broken World.

Naomi Reed, an award-winning Australian author, has commented on this collection: “In a world of overused phrases and didactic teaching, Miriam’s poems are honest and lyrical, allowing us to walk with her, to sigh with her, and to find our answers in the same place she does.”

I look forward to journeying with Miriam Dale through more of her poetry as she continues to wrestle with her restless soul, as she journals our common condition, and as she teaches us what it means that “my identity is … Beloved”.

Kara Martin is the Associate Dean of the Marketplace Institute, Ridley Melbourne, has been a lecturer with Wesley Institute and is an avid reader and book group attendee. Kara does book reviews for Hope 103.2’s Open House and Eternity.