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." |
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Page 38
... sitting in the clearing confused by moonlight and you sitting in the bare farmhouse amid the kerosene light . The two of you . CARRYING TORCHES AT NOON The boy came home from school 38 TASTERS FOR THE LORD.
... sitting in the clearing confused by moonlight and you sitting in the bare farmhouse amid the kerosene light . The two of you . CARRYING TORCHES AT NOON The boy came home from school 38 TASTERS FOR THE LORD.
Page 50
... sits with me out in front watching a sweet darkness begin in the fields . We try to decide whether I am lonely . I ... sit on . Unable to find words . BETWEEN AGING AND OLD I wake up like a stray 50 THE LORD SITS WITH ME OUT IN FRONT.
... sits with me out in front watching a sweet darkness begin in the fields . We try to decide whether I am lonely . I ... sit on . Unable to find words . BETWEEN AGING AND OLD I wake up like a stray 50 THE LORD SITS WITH ME OUT IN FRONT.
Page 69
... sits down . Two people finally come and call the ambulance . But too late . When everybody is gone , he reads some pages , and stops . Sits a moment , turns back to the place , and starts again . ME AND CAPABLANCA The sultry first night ...
... sits down . Two people finally come and call the ambulance . But too late . When everybody is gone , he reads some pages , and stops . Sits a moment , turns back to the place , and starts again . ME AND CAPABLANCA The sultry first night ...
Contents
GOING WRONG | 3 |
GOING THERE | 16 |
THE SPIRIT AND THE SOUL | 23 |
Copyright | |
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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