The Great Fires: Poems, 1982-1992JOYCE'S MOTTO has had much fame but few apostles. Among them, there has been Jack Gilbert and his orthodoxy, a strictness that has required of this poet, now in the seventh decade of his severe life, the penalty of his having had almost no fame at all. In an era that puts before the artist so many sleek and official temptations, keeping unflinchingly to a code of "silence, exile, and cunning" could not have been managed without a show of strictness well beyond the reach of the theater of the coy. The "far, stubborn, disastrous" course of Jack Gilbert's resolute journey--not one that would promise in time to bring him home to the consolations of Penelope and the comforts of Ithaca but one that would instead take him ever outward to the impossible blankness of the desert--could never have been achieved in the society of others. What has kept this great poet brave has been the difficult company of his poems--and now we have, in Gilbert's third and most silent book, what may be, what must be, the bravest of these imperial accomplishments. "From the Trade Paperback edition." |
From inside the book
Results 1-3 of 7
Page 20
... mouth to the berry , stretching . The throat is an elegant gray . A thousand shades , Christopher wrote among the crazy people . A thousand colors from white to silver . STEEL GUITARS The world is announced by the smell of 20 ...
... mouth to the berry , stretching . The throat is an elegant gray . A thousand shades , Christopher wrote among the crazy people . A thousand colors from white to silver . STEEL GUITARS The world is announced by the smell of 20 ...
Page 30
... mouth against the tiny ear and throw him higher . Pittsburgh and happiness high up . The only way to leave even the smallest trace . So that all his life her son would feel gladness unaccountably when anyone spoke of the ruined city of ...
... mouth against the tiny ear and throw him higher . Pittsburgh and happiness high up . The only way to leave even the smallest trace . So that all his life her son would feel gladness unaccountably when anyone spoke of the ruined city of ...
Page 63
... mouth meets the foreignness in another mouth . We stand looking at the ruin of our garden in the early dark of November , hearing crows go over while the first snow shines coldly everywhere . Grief makes the heart apparent as much as ...
... mouth meets the foreignness in another mouth . We stand looking at the ruin of our garden in the early dark of November , hearing crows go over while the first snow shines coldly everywhere . Grief makes the heart apparent as much as ...
Contents
GOING WRONG | 3 |
GOING THERE | 16 |
THE SPIRIT AND THE SOUL | 23 |
Copyright | |
6 other sections not shown
Other editions - View all
Common terms and phrases
Aegean afternoon afterward barley beautiful bewildered birds body cold comes crying dances dark Denmark DON GIOVANNI door dream dress empty Eurydice everything eyes face feet finally fire flesh GIFT HORSES girls goes going-home train hair happy HARM AND BOON hear heart horses IMAGINE THE GODS inside JACK GILBERT kerosene lamps listened live look LORD SITS lost marriage Mediterranean light MICHIKO DEAD Monolithos moon moonlight morning mountain naked nakedness Nogami olive trees Orpheus Passion Perugia Pittsburgh pleasure poems Prospero raccoon rain REC'D remember ripe river Rome ruined searching shutters silence singing smell snow soul spirit standing STEEL GUITARS stone street stubborn summer sunlight sweet talking teak tell things tomatoes trees trying Umbria UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA upstairs valley voice WABI walking watch weeds WHITE HEART wild window winter woman women woods young