A hard frost occurs when ground sur­face tem­per­a­tures drop to twen­ty-eight degrees or low­er for long enough to cause dam­age to plant cells, usu­al­ly end­ing the grow­ing sea­son. A Hard Frost is also the title of Judith Kerman’s twelfth book of poet­ry, a gor­geous col­lec­tion that speaks to the var­i­ous chal­lenges asso­ci­at­ed with grow­ing old — and to the vital­i­ty that resists the wide­ly held nar­ra­tive of the with­er­ing elder adult in decline. 

The nat­ur­al world lives and breathes in Kerman’s poems. Some­times, nature’s pres­ence feels omi­nous, as it does in sev­er­al of the poems in ​“Threat,” the first of five sec­tions in the col­lec­tion. Ker­man writes from the point of view of some­one who is close to nature but often views it from behind a win­dow in her home or the wind­shield of her car. The glass is like ​“a mem­brane,” sep­a­rat­ing the speak­er from the rain, snow, and preda­tors. But safe­ty is not guar­an­teed. There is a cer­tain law­less­ness, a dan­ger lurk­ing in these poems, expressed pow­er­ful­ly in Kerman’s strik­ing imagery. The speak­er in ​“Hunt­ing Sea­son” imag­ines her­self ​“a star­tled deer,” frozen, ​“the red bead of the laser pin­ning me.”

The body also plays a major role in the col­lec­tion. As she ages, Kerman’s body is becom­ing less depend­able. Kerman’s new phys­i­cal chal­lenges bring with them new per­spec­tives and insight. In ​“Dis­abled,” Ker­man writes, ​“The world fills with walls.” Flights of stairs are walls as is a ​“curb with­out a curb cut.” These poems con­tain frus­tra­tion and anger at the unwel­comed changes, but also often humor, and always a deter­mined will and the spir­it of com­mu­ni­ty. In ​“Brigade,” Ker­man writes of those los­ing mobil­i­ty. She speaks to what they once did with ease — ​“hiked moun­tains / ran up stairs” — and to how, in spite of the loss­es, they are far from throw­ing in the tow­el: ​“We push and limp / pump and lift … By night we dream / of storm­ing the beaches.” 

Change requires adap­tion, and with a loss of bal­ance, a need for reori­ent­ing. (“Adap­tion” and ​“Reori­ent­ing” are titles of two of Kerman’s poems.) There is a pal­pa­ble sad­ness that accom­pa­nies the long­ing for what she and oth­ers can no longer claim as their own. And yet, there is an unflinch­ing per­se­ver­ance that runs through the poems, per­haps felt most strong­ly in Kerman’s fifth and last sec­tion, ​“Per­sis­tence.”

While the nat­ur­al world is always close by, it moves front and cen­ter in the poems that con­clude the col­lec­tion. We read of Kerman’s kin­ship with seag­ulls — who, like the deer, stars, rain, and creeks — are always in motion. She writes mov­ing­ly of trees, the con­nect­ed­ness of us all. She writes of grief as a stone, hav­ing ​“heft.” There is change, yes, but a stead­fast­ness, too. Read­ers will expe­ri­ence a deep sat­is­fac­tion, after trav­el­ing with Ker­man along the book’s love­ly arc from fear to fight to accep­tance — and to growth. This col­lec­tion will stay with them long after they read the last poem.

Ker­man does not sug­ar­coat the chal­lenges of liv­ing in an aging body, yet we nev­er lose sight of the fact that her mind and spir­it are very much intact. No hard frost has end­ed her grow­ing sea­son. Ker­man is a cre­ative force, and read­ers of her lat­est col­lec­tion will be the bet­ter for it.