Merely Players, Poems by Anne Harding Woodworth

The delightful poems of Merely Players belie the weighty concerns that are at their foundation. 

Sample Poems by Anne Harding Woodworth

“Anne Harding Woodworth’s poetry is always compelling, always intriguing, by turns humorous, grave, whimsical, tender and, often, instructive (how did I not know a crossopterygian had a ‘sort of coccyx-flagellum’?). This poet engages with the whole world in its many parts, and the reader is enthralled, turning page after page, captive of the urge to know what nugget the next poem will offer. Woodworth sees and conveys in artful lines (deploying occasional dialogues and interrupted soliloquies to great effect) the truths and secrets that lie behind the scrims of daily life, and we delight in the redressing of our naiveté. The ingenious composition of this book is the basis for its charm and allows the poet space and variety to showcase her unique insights. I love Merely Players, beginning to end.”—Nancy Fitz-Hugh Meneely

“The opening poem of Merely Players spans humankind’s emergence from the primeval sea and a futuristic colonization of the Moon to bring back water to a parched Earth. The vast world-stage of this collection features an eclectic cast including magicians, mime artists, baroque dancers, footballers and dental hygienists. Real life and literal theatre overlap as when thunder from without confuses a movie theatre audience, and actual experience is parceled into acts and scenes, most memorably in A Collage in Three Acts where the poet incorporates the verse and song lyrics of her talented soccer-playing sons to generate a moving chronicle of a close-knit family. Anne Harding Woodworth’s antenna is alert to the most arcane of subjects, but her forensic eye is matched by a warm heart. The world’s a stage maybe, but the men and women of this collection are not merely players: they are much more fascinating than that.”—Michael Durack 

“‘All the world’s a stage,’ begins Jaques’ monologue in As You Like It, a speech that is often quoted but rarely understood in the context of the joyous complexities of Shakespeare’s play. Merely Players serves as a beautiful corrective to that speech’s melancholy mansplaining. Whereas Jaques’ myopic vision of life is rigidly prescribed, the ever-changing, on-the-move poems in Woodworth’s latest collection—which include collage, soliloquy, scripts, and persona poems—are jam-packed with interrogations of the self, the female body, and the shimmering incandescence of our artmaking in its myriad forms. Readers of this book will encounter tap dancing, acting, photography, movies, and a rapturous final sequence about the World Cup, and they’ll find poems that leave space for both tragedy and joy, all the while listening intently for the music that heads us home.”—Matt Donovan

Anne Harding Woodworth’s work is published widely in print and online. Merely Players is her ninth book. She is a member of the Board of Governors at the Emily Dickinson Museum. Anne lives with her husband in Washington, DC, when they aren’t at their cabin in the mountains of Western North Carolina. 

ISBN: 978-1625494757, 118 pages

Order link from Amazon coming soon!

Also by Anne Harding Woodworth:

Spare Parts: A Novella in Verse

The Artemis Sonnets, Etc.

The Eyes Have It

Trouble

The Spare Parts Saga