I Want This World

I Want This World explores what it means to be human and in danger across many landscapes: the costs of World War II to family-forced labor in Siberia, the Italian Campaign, prison camp in Murmansk, as a hostage in Africa and in the muddied politics in the Rio Grande Valley. We feel the complexity, terror and beauty inherent in each of these domains.
If I Want This World is about moments that overcome as well as those that make us shudder, it is also about delight and irresistible love. The poet laughs herself to collapse seeing the roseate spoonbills, the great crater, Ngorogoro, the immigrants' shrine in the Rio Grande Valley, the way Poles crowd Chopin's house every Sunday for concerts as if Chopin were still playing his Polonaise.
Margaret Szumowski challenges us to experience the ineffable. Reading about Bronislaw, Czechek, Victor, Christine, and Jan Szumowski, we wonder how to measure ourselves against the previous generation without feeling inadequately endowed with courage. To understand the effect of war on the human spirit, the poet gently brings us to enter the minds of another generation.