Art That Elevates Poetry

In 101 Ways to Fall Apart, Faust expertly achieves the rare combination of poetry and artwork that, once blended, elevates each to a separate plane. Without taking too much from the poetry, the art carries the work, making visual the ache and sorrow present in each flowy poetic instance.

The critique I felt like making most often during my time with the poems was that I would have appreciated more art for the way it broke up the text and provided space for truly visceral response to the themes and constructs Faust explored.

All that to say, the poetry, while at times drubbing similar vistas to near-annoyance for its dwelling on similar tropes, is elegant, purposive, and exploratory of the human condition when leant to sorrow. If ever a book warranted the descriptor elegiac, it is this one.

Conclusion

The book is large, running over three hundred pages. The kind of thing I feel I might return to on foggy mornings when I need a reminder of how literature allows for deeper empathy. When taken all at once, it might become too much. But on the individual level, these poems beckon me back and the book becomes a prism wherein I might always find new angles or glints of literary delight.

101 Ways to Fall Apart is published by Nightshade Publications.