Grief Songs: Poems of Love & Remembrance

Grief Songs: Poems of Love and Remembrance is a collection of poetry set to photographs. It revolves around the author’s family and the strength of her love for them.

The opening photo of a gravestone leaves no doubt that the main subject of this book will be George: the author’s brother. The photos then take a chronological journey from Gauffreau’s early childhood to the present day, depicting family outings, treasured moments: “Wait till your father gets home not a threat but a promise”, and happy-in-the-photo moments with underlying tension: “Daddy’s favorite portrait / little did he know / George had cried piteous tears while I railed against my bangs”.

The family photographs are typical of their time: a black-and-white portrait with colour added, posed black-and-white shots from the 1950s and 1960s, moving to colour snapshots as the technology in the 1970s developed. Not always in focus, not always perfectly composed, such photography will be familiar to anyone who has photo albums recording the lives of people born before the digital age.

The poems are short: three to four lines each. Each poem follows a photo, contextualising what is in the frame with the author’s thoughts and memories.

The layout of the book makes it difficult to follow: the lack of hard returns jumbles up the lines of the poems, interrupting the flow. The pictures and poems flow without break, making it confusing to follow as the text is not always on the same page as the photo it supports. Headings are used; however, it is unclear why some of them are large and bold and others are in smaller font. Lack of attention to such details diminishes the reader experience.

Grief Songs is a quick read. The subject matter is not compelling enough to warrant a break in order for the reader to process the emotion of it. Therefore, the pictures and poems become a list of experiences that the reader is detached from – pleasant enough to engage in, without making an impact.

Grief Songs is worthy as a good family memory, an example of what people can do with an old photo collection to honour its inhabitants. Whether it makes an impression beyond that is for the reader to judge.