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sloatsj's review
4.0
I ran across Montejo’s poems in an issue of the literary journal Jubilat, which published three poems from this translated collection. What drew me to the poems was a sense of mystery, and the poet’s projection into nature of his thoughts and ideas.
The poems do deal a lot with nature, but also with family and ancestry and origins. Though those themes often conjure up something dull and dry and done-before, it’s good poetry, and engaging. The best poems show unique imagination. Among my favorite poems were “The Rooster’s Song” and “The Trees,” both of which were in Jubilat. I also liked “Table,” “Departure” and “Iceland” a lot.
Here is the first stanza of “The Trees:”
The trees speak so little, you know.
They spend their entire life meditating
and moving their branches.
Just look at them closely in autumn
as they seek each other out in public places:
only the oldest attempt some conversation,
the ones that share clouds and birds,
but their voice gets lost in the leaves
and so little filters down to us, nothing really.
I found the poem extremely appealing – I like imagining the trees could speak, but mostly don’t, all caught up in their meditations, and even if we were paying close attention, there wouldn’t be much for us to take away.
Among the family poems I liked were “Elegy for the Death of My Brother Ricardo,” and “Transfigured Time,” which begins –
The house where my father will be born
is still unfinished.
It lacks the wall my hands have not yet built.
For all its chunky jewels, on the whole the book wasn’t knock-your-socks-off poetry. Some poems really shine, but others, while well written and lovely, didn’t seem to take me anywhere I’d never been before. Or, if our destinations are always the same (death, love, loss, god, family, earth), the mode of conveyance at least wasn’t remarkable. Take “Lovers,” for example – here’s the beginning:
They loved each other. They were not alone on the earth;
they had night, its blue evenings,
its sunset clouds.
They lived in the other, they shuddered
like two unopened petals in the depths
of some flower of the air.
It is not easy to criticize this poem. It’s lovingly written, and if I were fresh in love I’d probably be more receptive, but as it is seems rather the “regular fare.”
I still recommend the book. Montejo is Venezuela’s most famous poet. The end section includes prose fragments and a short essay. My favorite fragment is:
“What sometimes irritates in T.S. Eliot is that he almost always inserts quotations from poets of the past in his verses, while he completely omits quotations from poets of the future.”
There are two typos in the book, always a bummer, but the book and cover are quite handsome. One funny thing is the cover has a little banner that says “As Featureed in the Oscar-Nominated Film ’21 Grams.’” Now poetry is going places folks.
The poems do deal a lot with nature, but also with family and ancestry and origins. Though those themes often conjure up something dull and dry and done-before, it’s good poetry, and engaging. The best poems show unique imagination. Among my favorite poems were “The Rooster’s Song” and “The Trees,” both of which were in Jubilat. I also liked “Table,” “Departure” and “Iceland” a lot.
Here is the first stanza of “The Trees:”
The trees speak so little, you know.
They spend their entire life meditating
and moving their branches.
Just look at them closely in autumn
as they seek each other out in public places:
only the oldest attempt some conversation,
the ones that share clouds and birds,
but their voice gets lost in the leaves
and so little filters down to us, nothing really.
I found the poem extremely appealing – I like imagining the trees could speak, but mostly don’t, all caught up in their meditations, and even if we were paying close attention, there wouldn’t be much for us to take away.
Among the family poems I liked were “Elegy for the Death of My Brother Ricardo,” and “Transfigured Time,” which begins –
The house where my father will be born
is still unfinished.
It lacks the wall my hands have not yet built.
For all its chunky jewels, on the whole the book wasn’t knock-your-socks-off poetry. Some poems really shine, but others, while well written and lovely, didn’t seem to take me anywhere I’d never been before. Or, if our destinations are always the same (death, love, loss, god, family, earth), the mode of conveyance at least wasn’t remarkable. Take “Lovers,” for example – here’s the beginning:
They loved each other. They were not alone on the earth;
they had night, its blue evenings,
its sunset clouds.
They lived in the other, they shuddered
like two unopened petals in the depths
of some flower of the air.
It is not easy to criticize this poem. It’s lovingly written, and if I were fresh in love I’d probably be more receptive, but as it is seems rather the “regular fare.”
I still recommend the book. Montejo is Venezuela’s most famous poet. The end section includes prose fragments and a short essay. My favorite fragment is:
“What sometimes irritates in T.S. Eliot is that he almost always inserts quotations from poets of the past in his verses, while he completely omits quotations from poets of the future.”
There are two typos in the book, always a bummer, but the book and cover are quite handsome. One funny thing is the cover has a little banner that says “As Featureed in the Oscar-Nominated Film ’21 Grams.’” Now poetry is going places folks.
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