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FIRST IMPRESSIONS

Early Days with Anne

Don Gutteridge

Coming soon

The moving and intimate latest collection from award-winning Gutteridge is rich with tight, lyrical poems that chronicles his journey of love with his wife Anne. “Thankfully, first impressions/ are seldom the last or fail/ to tell the tale,” Gutteridge ruminates in “A Seldom Case,” the opening poem, as he spots Anne in Elmira District High in the fateful Fall of ‘sixty’. And from there, he beautifully captures his journey with Anne, delving into their slow-budding romance, including the detours to an old-order Mennonite Farmstead on their way home from school, the not-so-first date, dancing at Leisure Lodge, rides in Anne’s silver Volks, unenthusiastic family meets, and ultimately the wedding in “the stately grey edifice of the County Court House in Guelph’s Market Square.” Gutteridge writes with quiet, urgent poigancy that gives these poems a flickering liveliness: “I spoke my love with roses,/ as golden as the gilded apples/ of the Hesperides: a long-/ stemmed flourish of flowers/ to let you know how much/ that flawless autumn of country/ walks and city-side/ saunters meant to me.” “Some October” recalls a hilarious incident as a colleague suspecting the couple’s burning chemistry invites them to his home to meet his wife and tries to lure them to reveal their secret. “Do Me Too” is filled with moments of deep, affecting tenderness made fierce by intense prose. Full of affecting emotion and profound tenderness, the collection makes for an ardent and moving tribute to a blissful relationship.

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