Thursday 8 March 2012

Mary Leader's Beyond the Fire (Shearsman, 2011), first selection





If a painting
Looks like nothing so much as a painting,
That is the ultimate realism. That is why

I would paint these geraniums blue-gray
And the fence behind them red.

*

Important as a cat's yawn, lovely and true.


from "Letter to Arkady Plotnitsky"


The rays long-pale slanting--

Late, conveying loss, nostalgia, and end to
Things (untranslatable). I well know it.

from "To Gaze Is to Think"


The ages have this as their provinces surely the
Way a mother holds a baby incorporated into a breathlessly long series
So I am after eschewing the cult of the individual
I am sorry in different hands

from "Linen Repeatedly Folded"


When Dad had his stroke and she was surrounded by His relatives, her enemies; she was mad at me. I am the one who says so. Looking back, I suspect My mind was attractive. Just in time I know this.


from "Mnemosyne"


A woman of the winds anticipates
Bartering old harmonies for sheep, sheep
For wool, wool for cloth, cloth for paraphrase,
Common language for a spell of godspeed....

*

Redundance
Is not possible but repetition
Is.


from "Death of a Gypsy"


Those were many beads glowing out of the dark.
No, those were the nights of childhood.
No, those were fiery craters.


last stanza of "Mimesis"


You can learn more about the book and find links for purchasing here on Shearsman's website.

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