Rainbow Awards Honorable Mention: Desire Returns for a Visit by Sandra de Helen

Desire Returns for a Visit: Intimate Poems about Lesbian Love

"The poetry in this book was a bit hit and miss for me but as I was judging it overall, I give it an outstanding rate."

"The author wrote with lyrical, beautiful sentences that painted pictures in my mind. Her choices in style and presentation were fabulous."

"[Sandra de Helen's] book of poems is a great way to read a truthful, witty, poignant memoir about lesbian love."
Judy Grahn, Ph.D., poet, writer, trailblazer

"I didn't need to read beyond the first line of the first poem in Sandra de Helen's collection Desire Returns to know I'd be loving this book: "Wearing makeup is as unnecessary as / painting crickets." What a fanciful imagination. What a cohesive, splendidly ordered body of work.

It's not often I find poems that speak so directly of and to my lesbian heart. Love poems all, even when love kicks and confuses, this poet portrays the lesbian core.

Nor does de Helen speak to lesbians only. The universality of love, erotic desire, heartbreak, romantic struggle, all are here. From the poem "Donations" comes this lovely metaphor: "My pail of dreams has been tipped out." She allows her gentle humor free reign, as in a poem about falling for cast-off lovers.

Sandra de Helen is a fine poet, by turns earthy, erotic, ethereal, funny, a lesbian herstorian, a lover, a beloved. Her poems will be loved as well."

Lee Lynch, novelist, essayist, short story writer, trailblazer