Unexpected Light
by C.E. Chaffin
Diminuendo Press. 138 Pages. $12.00
Reviewed by Stephen Page
In Unexpected Light, C.E. Chaffin attempts to articulate in verse bipolar disorder—his version of bipolar disorder through his experiences and his selection of poetry. Chaffin documents numerous episodes of mania and depression in a thick assortment of 119 poems and binds them inside a seemingly non-descript cover.
In “Off Lithium,” Chaffin reveals a maniac period in his life:
Drank a twelve-pack and didn’t feel it,
slept three hours and woke refreshed
with the marvelous idea of making shoes
with living grass for insoles.
. . . am I talking too fast?
In “Demon Melancholy,” Chaffin shows how depression comes upon him:
His cold breathe steams up my neck
Like dry ice. I never see him approach.
Chaffin rides his ups and downs like a perpetual passenger on a San Francisco street car. He never disembarks. He does, however, complete his purpose with the book—to poetically express what it is like to be bipolar. He often speaks about medications he ingests, but he arrives at no destinational cure for his illness except that somewhere in the midst of his hill-and-dale emotions he discovers the plateau of acceptance. It is only by cognizing that his mental disorder is the mode of transportation he needs to take in life, and by swallowing the proper cocktail of pharmaceuticals to alleviate motion sickness, that he is able to cope. “Eternal Recurrence,” a poem trouncing another person’s reasoning that mania is necessary to rise out of depression, is by the title alone, indicative to Chaffin that bipolar disorder has no panacea or end.
Chaffin’s purpose in this book is creditable. Not many mood-balanced people know what a bipolar person goes through, so the book is educational; not many bipolars can articulate well what they are going through, so the book is a friend, an ally, a hope to cope.
The cover of the book is fitting—a somber red with light gray lettering—possibly chosen as a humble alternative to graphics in order to keep the price of the book low, but more than likely chosen as representational of its contents—the blood red symbolizing graveness, and the light gray (not bright white) symbolizing a glow of hope, but not the light at the end of the tunnel.
Note: this review first published in the Sunday edition of the Buenos Aires Herald, May 9, 2010.
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