Some poetry books lay out poems as if they were little fossils slotted into display drawers where a reader can marvel at them—opening and shutting pages—viewing poems in or out of order. Lyrics shape their own encounters. But I’m a reader who loves momentum. I relish connections that riff and shimmer, and encourage readers to piece together stories. Sati Mookherjee’s new poetry book, EYE, offers that sweet shimmer of beautiful lyrics and the riff and pacing of a poetic narrative. I am smitten by how readable the book is, how compelling the story is, and how beautifully crafted the individual poems are. To construct poems within a narrative arc, without overloading the freight of exposition onto individual lyrics, is really challenging. Mookherjee works magic here.
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