Age of Orpah by Carin Smeaton
Age of Orpah is a collection of poetic narratives & dissident poetry. Orpah is the final fantasy – last bastion – fierce potiki – of a beautifully polemic trinity following Hibiscus Tart & Death Goddess into the infinite centre. She scoops up our fragile world gasping for air into her loving arms & spits out its denials into the depths of the moana. Some rabbi might call her a hussy but she’s more than that – much more! She remembers injustices in Aotearoa & beyond. And she takes notes at her own peril. Through Orpah you can watch these far flung worlds converge. Read her and resist!
“Multilayered, challenging, and full of deep memory. It really should be read.” – Erik Kennedy, Landfall Tauraka Review (on Death Goddess)
“Carin’s kupu come sideways, they break the rules, they respect the kuia and the power of slang, her poems are a testament to staying sly and aware, her angles are always a beautiful surprise, she embraces the ordinary and the divine, and biting into her mahi is to experience both, like popping candy let loose in the cage of the waha.” —Talia Marshall