Seeds Planted in Concrete

great writer! the book itself shows the stages of loving to grieving and back to loving oneself :) wherever you are in your healing journey, keep going! ❤️‍🩹 am rooting for you 🌱✨

This is a wonderful collection of love- and life-affirming poems for young and old alike. Some of the verses and prose poems may remind some readers of Thich Nhat Hanh's "You Are Here" or Pema Chodron's "fail fail again fail better"; other selections echo earlier writers such as Anne Sexton, Sylvia Plath, Erica Jong and even a kind of synthesized Doris Lessing. And some of this poetry would make excellent lyrics for many of today's young singers/songwriters. With poems that read like an enchanting conversation with someone who has just come back from an incredible journey, the author celebrates and shares her experiences of the pain and joy of love, bringing the essence of her deep, personal growth into the realm of the universal; indeed, even to telling how the cosmos itself is part of the heart's journey. With some lines that will stay with you for a long time, she describes how long-treasured aspirations about herself and her relation to love crumbled and how she came to learn that this crumbling was necessary in order for a more enlightened self-understanding to take root. Her poignant poetry shows how she became aware of herself as a whole human being by pushing through that rubble and flourishing in a way that allows her to share the experience. Through her poetry, we see how the process of finding or creating good ways to face difficult times is an essential part of being real to yourself and to others, of being someone who continues to learn how to "love in the most enduring of ways" and of being someone who knows joy in the journey. This volume would also be an asset to a high school or college syllabus, though I can only guess at the number of differing interpretations that students would make of the picture on the cover!

Thought provoking and well Written. It touched me very deeply and had me pause often to reflect on the weight of the message. I loved that.

This is a very nice book. Short poems and thoughts presented sensitively. Feminine perspective soft and calming.

I became familiar with the author on Thought Catalog. I think she has a beautiful perspective to share on love and humanity. If you are in need of some affirmation that the love you long for truly exists, you will enjoy this collection of essays. However, you'll have to be in the right mind frame to digest it, because it's quite sticky sweet and metaphorical, comically so at times. Like you get the sense that the author probably makes herself cry with her own beautiful sentiments. If you read it all in one sitting, which is easy to do, you'll find yourself rolling your eyes at her affinity for the words bones and cells and ribcages. Yet it somehow works, her voice is distinctive and if you're seeking out this book, you probably are in the mind frame to receive it, find it inspirational and comforting and be better off for having read it.

love your work. your truth. your waves of emotional potency and humanness being breath + rawness to life. Bianca, your writing heals. thank you. thank you.

Seeds Planted in Concrete is a very empowering read. It reminds you that you should love yourself first before anyone else. What I like in this book is that it's full of positivity. It's different compared to the other poetry books that I've read this year which were full of angst and will make you feel sad and depressed. But this book isn't like that. Yes, the author mentioned about loss and being broken but she wrote it in a way that will invigorate you. I urge everyone to read this book, even those who aren't inclined to poetry. Everyone should read this book. It's beautiful and will make you love yourself more.

I will bring up this book of poems in every conversation I have with close friends because this is well worth the read. I've had to read this book in private places because of how intimately woven her words are. I'm looking forward to experiencing more of her thoughtful, mature, and empathetic observations of life and love.