Arms Filled with Bittersweet

Arms Filled with Bittersweet

Arms Filled With Bittersweet is just that … an intimate glimpse, via poetry and prose, into a bittersweet mid-century childhood in rural Connecticut. With gentle humor and simple elegance, the author offers a collection of layered memories and braided reflections, choosing to gaze more deeply into the subtle complexities of the time, mostly of love, its disguises, and the creativity it took to thrive then and later. As she says in her opening Note to Readers: For me, my family has become a long and lyrical poem … its margins smudged with cryptic notes, its rough drafts fraught with strong punctuation. Everywhere there are bad line breaks and the never-ending cut and paste of endless revisions … forever meant to be a work in progress. "Sulima Malzin's memoir brims with compelling, image-rich recollections of her eventful early years. Hers is a post-Depression, hardscrabble childhood in which a beggar regularly comes to her family farmhouse asking for food. One day he brings her a gift, one that anticipates Malzin's own talent and her eventual gift to us, her readers: a leather-bound book of poems. This memoirist offers us both poetry and reflective prose stitched together with the thread of her compassionate wisdom, 'the kind of thread that never breaks.'" -Paulann Petersen, Oregon Poet Laureate Emerita "In Arms Filled with Bittersweet , Sulima Malzin's razor-sharp memory recreates for us the hard scrabble post-war farm of her childhood, her mother's loneliness, the immoveable bigotry of her father's family. But it is her heart, her generosity, both as a person and as a writer, that enriches it, softens it, without sentimentalizing or dismissing it, makes it possible for us not only to visit it with her but to appreciate it. The poetry and prose complement each other and the period perfectly. I am glad I read this lovely, small, meaningful book." -Jean Zorn, Publisher, Persimmon Tree "In her memoir, Arms Filled with Bittersweet , Sulima Malzin begins braiding memories in the womb, accentuating the positive while realistically exploring the prejudice and sacrifices that accompanied a post-war world. Sharing her surroundings is like looking through a lace tablecloth, nodding to nostalgia while glimpsing a more promising future. Lovingly written, the adventure does not end, but continues, leaving the reader clutching a corner of lace, confident that the author is content and comfortable within herself in that 'holy spot between the beauty and the brokenness.' We all should be so fortunate." -Barbara M. Traynor, author of Second Career Volunteer "Rich in detail and sensory experience, Arms Filled with Bittersweet is a lyrical journey through the author's family history. Sulima introduces us not only to her parents, but both sets of grandparents, as well as her baby brother, the 'little boy who could not live,' and her mother's oldest friend, whose laugh was loud and who swore in Polish. But it is the strong and grateful sense of self that weaves like '...a jumble of colored thread tangling around scraps of lace and ribbon...' inviting us to examine our own rich histories and to give thanks." -Ann Farley, poet and author of Tell Her Yes While it was, of course, my parents who brought me to life, I believe it was not only they, but their parents and theirs and theirs who made me more curious than fearful, more spiritual than religious, and more resilient than stoic.   Olga and Albert gave me their love as best they could, and named me Shirley Carolyn Malcein. I, in turn, gave life to my five precious children, loving them as best I knew how.   These writings, gathered in what is now my 83rd year, are the result of my efforts to come to terms with all that has been my life. Most of the details that are left out have been left out intentionally. Not every story needs to be told and not every story is mine to tell.   Between these covers is a collection of layered memories and braided reflections on a somewhat rugged rural family life in Southington, Connecticut during the aftermath of the Second World War and the changes that came with it.   While taking some notice of what it was like to live as the child of First (or second) Generation American farmers during a time when both Russian and German prejudice ran high and racism and bigotry was common, I have chosen to gaze more deeply into the subtle complexities of that time ... mostly of love, its disguises, and the everyday creativity it took to thrive amidst the ongoing external forces over which we have no control.   For me, my family has become a long and lyrical poem ... its margins smudged with cryptic notes, its rough drafts fraught with strong punctuation. Everywhere there are bad line breaks and the never-ending cut and paste of endless revisions ... forever meant to be a work in progress. Arms Filled with Bittersweet Copyright © 2022 by Sulima Malzin All rights reserved, but permission to reproduce individual pieces will be freely granted