Days of Falling Flesh and Rising Moons by Steve Denehan

Welcome to Halfman, Halfbook for my stop on the Blog Tour for Days of Falling Flesh and Rising Moons by Steve Denehan and published by Golden Antelope Press.

About the Book

Steve Denehan’s wholehearted response to family life is the cornerstone of this wise and canny book. Through the tiny, everyday moments, we come to know an energetic seven-year-old daughter, a wife whose presence heals, a father aging into forgetfulness, and a host of others. We see bonds between parent and child strengthen through conversations about dinosaur-shaped clouds, questions about death, quiet humming, loud car-singing, evening bike rides. We witness an adult father re-seeing his own childhood, the parental decisions which had shaped him, and the decisions which he and his spouse are making as they give their Robin her wings. As songwriter Mark Nevin says, Steve Denehan is a “beautiful soul with an all too rare lightness of touch.”

The collection was finished before a virus named Covid-19 shook the globe and sent Ireland into a complete lockdown. However, that event seemed to require poetry, so ten of this collection’s final poems are late additions, Denehan’s responses to the pandemic. Taken together, they constitute a microcosm, not just of the Covid-19 world but of this poet’s interior landscape. They range from shock to acceptance, from strict observance of painful rules to moments of deep peace and bright wings.

Such intertwining keeps readers aware that both happiness and pain can be fragile, easily cracked or crumbled. Though wholehearted devotion to a rich family life is the collection’s cornerstone, it’s the awareness of complexity that gives Denehan’s Days of Falling Flesh and Rising Moons its essential shape.

About the Author

Steve Denehan is an award-winning poet who lives in Kildare, Ireland, with his wife Eimear and daughter Robin. He is the author of Miles of Sky Above Us, Miles of Earth Below (Cajun Mutt Press), Of Thunder, Pearls and Birdsong (Fowlpox Press), Living in the Core of an Apple (Analog Submission Press) and A Chandelier of Beating Hearts (forthcoming from Salmon Poetry). His numerous publication credits include The Irish Times, Poetry Ireland Review, Acumen, Westerly and Into The Void. He has been nominated for Best of the Net, Best New Poet and has been twice nominated for The Pushcart Prize.

My Review

Family life in all of its messy forms is one of the fundamental things that tie communities together across our world, especially in times like this. Steve Denehan’s new collection is a mirror reflecting back his close family; there is his seven-year-old daughter, his wife who can calm him, and his parents who are in their twilight years.

His messy, complexity and emotional real-life are present in all of the poems in here. The subject range is vast too, so there are verses on Karaoke, floating in a pool in the dark, painting a room, the joy of holding a buttercup under his daughter’s chin, bouncy castles and most of all love in all of its different forms.

You are still my father

but sometimes, now

in these darkening dusks

I have the privilege

of being yours

There is humour in these poems, but it is often framed with a black gilt edge, just like life really, we can be laughing at something one moment and soon after we are hearing of the latest tragedy to strike someone we know. The collection feels very relevant too; there are a few poems on his take on the COVID pandemic, the one that struck home the most is when his father goes to hug his daughter and is sharply told no by his mother. Covid has driven a 2m gap between generations of the same family and love and the warmth of a hug is forbidden.

I am old

I stand

Still

At the edge of the ocean

The salt air sings to me

A lullaby

I look across the infinite expanse of green-blue

hypnotised

As his first collection, Miles of Sky Above Us, Miles of Earth Below, Denehan puts his heart and soul into this, and his emotions soar and writhe in these short bursts of prose. I liked the variation in structure and the way that the form and layouts have been changed to suit particular poems. Another highly recommended collection.

Three Favourite Poems

Your Old Datsun Cherry

Fiat Ritmo

An Eight-Minute Summer

Don’t forget to visit the other blogs on the blog tour