A well thought out selection of appealing poems, nicely presented. ( )

Caroline Kennedy received poems from three friends on her fiftieth birthday. This led to the realization that poetry can play an important role in many seasons of our lives - from love to loss. This anthology is organized into sections based on major life events, such as falling in love, motherhood, growing up and growing old, work, friendship, death and grief. Some poems were familiar. "May Today There Be Peach Within" by St. Teresa of Avila is one of my favorites.

But others were new to me. And life Kennedy, the ones that resonated most illuminated the things that I am currently dealing with myself. I recently helped my mother sort through her belongings before her move to Iowa and then sorting through them again a few short weeks later after her unexpected death. My angst in deciding what to keep and what to get rid of is captured perfectly in the last stanza of Maxine Scates's poem, "Mother's Closet."

She wants to leave so much behind. Hours later
I've found nothing I want but the purple mache mask
I made in the fourth grade. I like its yellow eyes.
She looks at each magazine I remove, saving
every word about my brother, the coach. He's sixty
and a long dead mouse has eaten the laces
of his baby shoes. I want order. I say
I'm old myself, I've started throwing things away.
I'm lying. I've kept everything she's ever given me. ( )

After the first few, I started skipping Caroline Kennedy's introductions because they were kind of pointless. But I loved the vast majority of the poems, and I love that I loved them, because—not for lack of exposure, and with a few exceptions—I have never really enjoyed poetry. I also am not especially into flowers, but the beautiful black-and-white close-ups were so lovely (anyone know what kind of flower they are?).

When Borders was (unfortunately) undergoing their going-out-of business liquidation sale a few years back, I purchased She Walks in Beauty: A Woman's Journey Through Poems, an anthology compiled by Caroline Kennedy, at a deep discount. I've glanced through it occasionally since, but recently I made a resolution to start reading poetry more often again, and this was one of the first volumes I took off my shelves. I'm glad I chose this one to get back into the habit of reading poetry.

Some people may question anything that the Kennedys have published, and that would include me -- I admit I wondered whether this anthology was going to be good. It is. This volume has substance, and is certainly not an attempt to coast on the Kennedy name.

The poems are organized by chapters; each chapter has an introduction penned by Kennedy. Chapter titles are:

--Falling in Love
--Making Love
--Breaking Up
--Marriage
--Work
--Beauty, Clothes, and Things of this World
--Motherhood
--Silence and Solitude
--Growing Up and Growing Old
--Death
--Friendship
--How to Live

As you can see, there is a wide-range of topics, meant to cover various stages of a woman's life. The choice of poets is also wide-ranging in style and time periods.

Of course, not every poem here is going to speak to every one. One that doesn't touch me now might in a few years. This could probably be said of any collection of poems, true; but I think this volume is one that's worth having. ( )

I nearly did not buy this collection of poems - I have issues with publisher's exploiting celebrity names to sell books (and the Kennedy name is about as "celebrity" as you can get, even to a non-American!), but I'm glad I did! While at times the introductory notes were too maudlin (and, at times, slipped into condescension), this ended up being a wonderful collection of poetry to relax with.

From the short, deeply profound words of Rumi & La Tzu, to the magnificent "The Summer Day" by Mary Oliver; from old favourites (How do I love thee?) to new discoveries (Letter from my Wife), this beautiful collection has something for every mood. It also held some surprises - who knew Elizabeth 1 wrote poetry?!

Particularly appealing was the well-constructed lay-out, consisting of sections each containing a variety of poetic voices speaking about different times/events in a woman's life (love, marriage, death, grief and so on).

A volume of poetry that can be dipped into again and again. ( )