The Spare Parts Saga, Poems by Anne Harding Woodworth

Anne Harding Woodworth’s The Spare Parts Saga is the journey of her book, Spare Parts: A Novella in Verse (Turning Point, 2008), as it is goes from Washington, DC, to a place between Co. Tipperary and Co. Clare, Ireland. It is not an easy trip. The poet chronicles her book’s several transatlantic crossings. The U.S. Postal Service’s daily tracking provides her with the titles of the poems, which prompt Anne to remember her past and to comment on life during the Covid pandemic, as well as to deride the USPS for the book’s circuitous travel.

Sample Poems by Anne Harding Woodworth

“In this beautifully written and, at times, humorous novella in verse, Anne Harding Woodworth tells a story within a story. It is ostensibly a tale about the misadventures of a novella in verse— aptly her novella in verse, Spare Parts—trying to navigate postal systems in order to get from one country to another. She successfully employs a clever device to achieve this: the tracking system which provides date, time and location of an item on its journey. But that story is, in turn, a vehicle for telling a story about other journeys—through locations, time, life, relationships, and the stress and strain of Covid. We meet a host of seemingly disparate characters who are effectively woven through her tale: family members, neighbors, a fitness trainer. This book is quirky and creative. It will make you laugh out loud, then stop to savor the wonderful arrangement of words. There are so many great lines in this story! The final couplet belies the fate of this book: ‘Some novellas in verse are quickly lost and forgotten / gone without goodbye and thrust wildly into airspace.’”—Eileen Trauth

“I hope that you will enjoy The Spare Parts Saga as much as I did. But first, let me give you some background. In April 2020, I began hosting Friday Lunchtime Poetry on Zoom, a weekly open mic originating in Co. Clare, Ireland, during the restrictive days of the Covid pandemic. Within weeks, the group grew to twenty-five or so poets and spanned many time zones from the UK to the US and onwards to Kuala Lumpur. Friendships formed. And from the poetry as well as life stories, discussions arose rife with fascinating information. Anne Harding Woodworth very rarely missed a week and always had something to contribute about poetry. This chapbook is an unexpected result of the weekly meetings, and an example of Anne’s eye for poetry in odd places like the US Postal Service. I urge you to read on.”—Martin Vernon

About the original Spare Parts: A Novella in Verse, Turning Point, 2008

 “There can’t be many works of literature that bring together St. Francis and Dale Earnhardt, but in this verse novella Anne Harding Woodworth has created an emotional and physical landscape capacious enough for both eminences.”—Baron Wormser

ISBN: 978-1625494566, 44 pages

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Also by Anne Harding Woodworth:

Spare Parts: A Novella in Verse

The Artemis Sonnets, Etc.

The Eyes Have It

Trouble