NYQ Books, 2016

Award-wining poet Alison Stone draws from her tarot in the latest collection. These 78 poems range from the archetypal (The Fool, The Magician, etc.) to the everyday situations of love, work, ideas, and conflicts that make up our lives.

Mythical figures from past and present appear—Prometheus and Persephone represent court cards, as do Lou Reed and Steve Jobs. By turns witty and heartbreaking, this book goes down easily enough to be devoured in one sitting yet reveals greater depths with each subsequent reading. Stone’s accessible lyrics move and entertain us with the struggles and joys of what it means to be human.

“Ordinary Magic, Alison stone’s wonderfully titled book of Tarot-themed poetry, returns the deck to its creative roots, for the cards were used to inspire poetry long before they were drafted as a tool for fortune-telling. Her cards on the Major Arcana, the 22 trump cards, follow closely the themes and imagery of the well-known Rider deck, while zeroing in on original details that make these symbolic pictures both personal and fresh. But it’s in the fifty-six suit cards, the so-called Minor Arcana, that Stone really shines. Largely abandoning the “official” imagery of the scenes (which are, in fact, only 100 years old), Stone allows the cards to suggest ideas, memories, and personal stories for poems that are immediate and alive.”

—Rachel Pollock