Empty the Ocean with a Thimble by Elizabeth Kirkpatrick-Vrenios

In Empty the Ocean with a Thimble, Elizabeth Kirkpatrick-Vrenios delves deeply into the subject of living with an abusive Finnish mother during a time of youthful exuberance. Her narrative and lyric style reflects the moods and colors of this extraordinary experience and her resolve in utilizing her Sisu to overcome.

Sample Poems by Elizabeth Kirkpatrick-Vrenios

"In Empty the Ocean with a Thimble, Elizabeth Kirkpatrick-Vrenios takes us on a journey through her Finnish-American childhood, a time of delight as well as of darkness. The poems that chronicle her youthful experiences-learning to ride a bike, going to the movies, practicing the piano-turn ominous, overshadowed by a mother who can't express love or understand her 'outlander' daughter's needs. 'I wear you like a cheerless jacket,' Vrenios says. But it is a jacket she manages, through her writing, to cast off, emerging as a poet of great spirit, heart, and determination-what the Finns call sisu."-Sue Ellen Thompson, Poet and Winner of the Maryland Author Award

"There's a strong current of 'Sisu' in Elizabeth Kirkpatrick-Vrenios's Empty the Ocean with a Thimble. 'Sisu,' she tells us, is 'a streak of madness/formidable/as the aurora borealis' that blew through her Finnish family; a streak the poet needed to endure a mother enraptured by its 'dark polar nights.' You'd think with such suffering the poems in this stunning collection would be bleak, yet light, even wicked humor shines though. Empty the Ocean with a Thimble casts a spell."-Tina Barry, Beautiful Raft, Mall Flower

ISBN: 978-1625493774, 54 pages

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