“The voice in these eight songs [of Sushila’s Canticles] seems constantly to be liberating itself from the artfully simple accompaniment; the melodies move in sinuous, ecstatic curves, ending often in the hauntingly unexpected; nuances of tone and word cling to the memory like a subtle scent. With friend and collaborator Lori Hedrick Helfand, Claudia Dudley has found a gratifying musical realization of her beautiful, sensitive poems.”

“Sushila’s Canticles bring me to silent wonder and gratitude. Here, in this late age, is a sister of Mirabai and Lal Ded.”

“I have just read, avidly, your three-part poem extrapolating on the great insight of the ancient Egyptians that, if you know that you ARE everywhere at the same time, you can be conscious of God now. Of course this is also what St. Augustine is trying to express when he says famously that “there is nowhere that God is not.” But neither statement can be parroted mentally; it must be felt and felt deeply, in silence and awe. For here we are in front of the ubiquitous mystery of Life, of Consciousness. Your three stories take us by very different routes to the threshold of that delicate edge of human awareness, and thankfully without commentary.”

“This book of poetry is inspired and inspiring. Claudia Dudley’s book raises fundamental questions about the nature of what is real. It deeply touches the heart with whispers of insight, free of arrogance of the mind. It calls us to the mystery of having been born, a little chunk of matter in this vast cosmos, made coherent enough to be able to breathe, feel both joy and pain, and think of the vastness for a few decades. We attempt to answer this, squeezing the mystery into manageable sentences. We parade our success and shun our failure. Who is myself in the midst of all this, and why?

Who breathes? Do I breathe or am I being breathed? The Mystery remains for us, as it did, in Waters of the Afternoon, for Sushila, one of the many incarnations of the safe Narada; and for another incarnation, the wise Solomon; for another, Alma, every woman; and for us all. Through our lives we participate in a great dance responding to the rhythms of an unknown and distant piper—sometimes the Guardian, sometimes the Beloved; always the Illusionist. Claudia Dudley asks, with much tender finesse and wonderful imagery, “What is this dance I was designed for?” The reader cannot not resonate in harmony and with gratitude. ”

“This work is monumental and perhaps threatening. The poem is long and deep. I went the length of it, most passages taking me to the next with interest and fine poetry and promise....I commend this huge, creative effort.”

“What is it these poems search for? Revelation of the intangible? What is otherwise invisible in the frames of time we live in? Not only does Claudia Jensen Dudley add a new voice to the poetic dialogue, but the tangible items in her poems convey the wellspring of the invisible discreetly.”

“{The Fragrant Fire} is an exquisite thing, and I thank you and also congratulate you. Talent fascinates me and craftsmanship delights me. And you have both in abundance. I’ve been too many years standing before a podium expounding English poetry to college students not to recognize both qualities when I recognize them.”