Joy Sullivan is a mastermind of poetry and imagery, able to weave motifs and senses into the lyrical verses and couplets she writes. Instructions For Traveling West is a brilliant poetry collection full of emotion and character and it has made me reconsider my stance on poetry.

First, you must realise you’re homesick for all the lives you’re not living. Then, you must commit to the road and the rising loneliness. To the sincere thrill of coming apart. So begins Joy Sullivan’s Instructions for Traveling West, a lush debut collection that examines what happens when we leave home and leap into the deep unknown. Mid-pandemic, Sullivan left the man she planned to marry, sold her house, quit her corporate job, and drove west. This dazzling collection tells that story as it illuminates the questions haunting us. What possible futures lie on the horizon? What happens when we heed the call of furious reinvention? A book for anyone flinging themselves into fresh starts, Instructions for Traveling West grapples with loss, loneliness and belonging. These poems teach us that naming our desire is profound alchemy. Each of us holds the power to set our own course forward. Expansive and heart-opening, exquisite in their specificity, galvanising in their scope, the poems speak to the longing that lives within us all. They remind us that “joy is not a trick.”

With chapters to structure the shifting narrative themes, Instructions For Travelling West flows like water, glistening with light and life. The poems live and breathe, vivid snapshots so tangible they seem to be just out of view, hidden in the corner of your eye. The sensory description is rich and enticing, the overarching themes poignant and long-lasting, and you will finish this collection of poems wishing you could go back and read them again for the first time. They are that powerful and that mesmerising.

I don’t read a lot of poetry or poetic prose, as I have previously established in my post about Siobhan Harvey’s Ghosts. It takes a specific voice to call to me and make me feel invested in the musicality of written word. That’s a good way to describe poetry – like music. Not all genres of music will appeal to everyone, and I certainly have my references. I think Instructions For Travelling West will be a favourite for many though and I highly encourage you to pick it up and give it a few hours of your time. It won’t take long to read at all, but you will be left thinking about it for days. Joy Sullivan is a genius and Instructions For Travelling West is only the beginning of her long, fruitful career ahead.