Blog

 Jennifer Gurney’s “Indelible Ink: Postcard Poems and Paintings from the 2025 Postcard Poetry Fest” is a vibrant collection of short poems that transforms ordinary summer experiences into moments of reflection. Published by Prolific Pulse Press, the book contains poems originally written as first drafts on postcards for the 2025 Poetry Postcard Festival.

 The postcard format suits Gurney’s poetry perfectly. Her poems are brief, conversational, and often deceptively simple, like her paintings. Yet behind these small observations lie questions about time, memory, mortality, hope, and happiness’s fleeting nature.

One of the most memorable poems asks whether fruit flies know that they have only a day to live and whether such knowledge changes how they spend that day.

“Do fruit flies know

they have only

a day to live?

does it change

how they spend that day?”

 What begins as an observation about an insignificant creature becomes a quiet meditation on human mortality. Another poem wonders what tulips do while waiting for the next spring and asks, “Do flowers sleep?”  The childlike curiosity of the question gives the poem its charm while suggesting the larger cycles of waiting, dormancy, and renewal.

Summer is the collection’s dominant landscape. Gurney writes about beaches, rain, sun tea, thunderstorms, watermelon, blueberries, fireflies, and childhood games. Poems about running through sprinklers and catching fireflies evoke a strong sense of nostalgia, while “how is it July already?” captures the universal feeling that beautiful seasons pass too quickly.

Throughout the collection, the tone is warm, playful, and observant, though sometimes shadowed by melancholy. In “in the gloaming,” loneliness and magic coexist, suggesting that solitude can sometimes become a space for wonder.  Similarly, “wishing on the first star, tonight” ends with the simple but powerful affirmation that “hope lives.”

A beautiful alliterative tone is found in the poem:

“sunshine, sun tea

sunscreen, sunrise, sunset

summertime”

Gurney also brings contemporary and personal references into her poems naturally. Going to the movies to escape the summer heat, the memory of Shakespeare performed at the Ashland stage in 1977, and the sensation of an airplane becoming airborne all connect everyday experiences with cultural and personal memory. 

The central message of “Indelible Ink” is simple: notice life before it disappears. Gurney finds poetry in things we often overlook. She reminds us that ordinary moments can become precious memories when we pay attention.

This collection will appeal particularly to readers who enjoy short-form poetry, nature writing, nostalgic reflections, and accessible, image-driven verse. It is also ideal for readers who are new to poetry because its language is uncomplicated and its subjects are immediately relatable.

In the collection “Indelible Ink”, the poems may be postcard-sized, but their emotional reach is far greater. “Indelible” suggests something that cannot be erased or forgotten, and Gurney uses these small poems to preserve fleeting moments, emotions, and observations in lasting words. What might seem ordinary or momentary becomes something permanent and worth remembering in Gurney’s pen.