Eeva Kilpi's A Landscape blossoms Within Me, an English translation which collects Kilpi's work from 1972 to 2000, is a darkly funny and often moving collection. The scope of Kilpi's writing is epic, moving through relationships, sex, nature, ageing, to death. The collection is separated into eight sections, and the printing of the poems mostly follows the order in which they were published.
As it explores complex issues, the collection remains grounded and accessible. In the introduction, translator Donald Adamson notes that, when translating poems in collaboration with Kilpi, he 'aimed at the natural conversational rhythms and vocabulary of English.' This informality gives a sense of intimacy. Each short poem sounds like a half-heard conversation.
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Kilpi is intensely funny, and the collection is littered with bawdy jokes. She can skilfully make-light of often morbid topics, such as divorce and adultery, without detracting from the poetry's emotional impact.
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There is also often something jabbing about Kilpi's humour, particularly in her religiously themed poems.
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I also enjoyed the intimacy between nature and death which is prevalent in A Landscape blossoms within me.
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This parallel between the growth of plants, almost always associated with life and positivity, and disease is at once disconcerting and uplifting.
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