Review: Kaleidoscope of Colors by Robert A. Cozzi

In Kaleidoscope of Colors, poet Robert A Cozzi has created a new collection of his verse using the motif of the kaleidoscope, a device that fractures and re-orders reality in microcosm, just as poems reduce and revive the color and a shape of life’s situations to give them new meaning.

In the opening Author’s Note, Cozzi questions why we always seem to “explain emotions,” calling our feelings “tricky devils.” But he likes them, even when they are painful and cloud his mind. Despite this rather dark segue, his first poem, “Jumping Off the Shelf” is hopeful, using images of steps on a journey leading to “an open door.”

The reality of the poet’s craft seems to infuse “Drowning in Words” – “When words come, everything else disappears…” and, looking at inspiration from without, “Private Performance” highlights the experience of music to the poet’s ear:

My spirits lift
When I hear the intro
And imagine the artist
Raising their instrument
And playing
Just for me…

The drearier side of life’s path, though, is never far from Cozzi’s imagining. In “Cast Off,” he expresses bitter rejection from a “disloyal lover”: “…his heart cast off as bait in shark infested waters…”

Several pieces are pure prose, such as Cozzi’s recollection of a meeting in 2011 with Julian, who he first encountered in a train station. The young man, recently returned from a tour of duty in Iraq, was struggling, homeless and hungry. Cozzi helped him find a temporary job and a place to stay. In 2018, he was able to locate Julian, who is married and has a successful career, providing another positive spin in this wide-ranging look at life’s possibilities.

In earlier poetry collections, Cozzi has shown a unique way with words, with each poem deceptively simple in its construction. While at times relying on cliches – for instance, “this world is your canvas” in “To The Young Artists” – the poems are still evocative and meaningful. The poems are not overloaded with obscure imagery, which makes them easily accessible, and those readers who may prefer more complex arrangements will still find themselves drawn to his verse, as his voice is so sincere and engaging.

The poems here are more sophisticated than past collections, and have a greater emphasis on the artistic process, as Cozzi seems to be looking back on the process of creating his earlier works. The imagery comes not just from momentary flashes of intuition, often described neatly in his poems, but also from the long slog of practice. The symbolic richness of these poems shows his progression as a poet, as does the cover, which is a marked improvement on previous collections.

All in all, Kaleidoscope of Colors is one of Cozzi’s finest works. It is impossible to categorize Cozzi’s varied ideas and poetic subjects, but that is what makes it more engaging and potentially more accessible to a larger group of readers, as he touches on many universal themes. He takes simple bits of life – an empty bed, old books, and picture frames – and makes them spark and pierce our recognition.