“It is she who paints with flowers that captivates the beams of light, directs the flights of bees and sends blooms skywards, competing with the sun itself all in her garden sanctuary. Always spinning, always bending the matter of the universe with her brush of time. Around and around and around in orbit, dancing like dust in light, like energy around the core, like souls meant to be. It is in this orbit I wish always to remain.”

— Steven P. Bloom, in memoriam

“Every once in a while we bump into a writer who invites us into her inner sanctum for a friendly chat. As Sharon Bloom shares her story you find yourself nodding your head in agreement. Yes, you say. Me too. That’s called poetry with a universal appeal. Ready for a friendly chat? Have a seat.”

— Gordy Whiteman, Guilford Poet Laureate Emeritus

“Sharon Bloom’s poetic perspective manages to be minute yet cosmic. She is imbued with the ways of the Earth but aware of the vastness that surrounds us—both time and space. This book is distinguished by the poet’s talent for appreciating the fragility of our lives and the generational persistence of objects, as in the wonderful poem spoken by a wooden spoon. The poet has experienced searing loss but that makes the appreciation all the stronger. This is a very real collection of poems by someone who has come to accept the mystery of our being here, an acceptance tinged with reverence and wonder.”

— Baron Wormser, author of The History Hotel

“In Sharon Austin Bloom’s nuanced and moving triptych of loss, Holding the Light, she takes us on a Dante-like spiritual journey. Rather than hell and heaven, she emphasizes we exist in a world of finding, holding, and losing that which we love—in her case, that most hellish of losses, the death of a child. Instead of being depressing, however, her poems are anything but. The best of them, like those of Blake and Wordsworth, hold out a hope beyond death through the unifying power of love and the holiness of nature.”

— Michael C. White, author of Resting Places