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seeyf's review against another edition
5.0
This is a book of poems that are quietly, painfully heartbreaking –– Marie Howe writes most significantly about the death of her brother John, but also of childhood abuse, divorce and the deaths of her friends. Instead of focusing entirely on the rawness of these tragic events, she turns a close eye towards the outside world and frames them with the elements of everyday life: a clogged kitchen sink, rain, tulips, snow, driving, parking, children’s games, kisses. This juxtaposition imbues the ordinary with new significance, but also describes the manner in which the world absorbs the drama of our inner lives yet continues on with its beauty and surprises, its little annoyances and dreary banality. It suggests that the two are intimately and necessarily bound together, and perhaps this recognition is what compels us to keep on living.
That is not to detract from the fact that there is genuine pain here, pain that gradually creeps in and crescendoes suddenly –– made even more shocking by the ordinariness of its surroundings and alluding to the fact that even these experiences are not unique to Howe but are repeated in a thousand quiet households, their cries silently suppressed. But above all Howe teaches us about death in lines that are powerfully spare and exact: how it changes us (“I had no idea that the gate I would step through/ to finally enter this world/ would be the space my brother’s body made.”); how so much of the process of loss is the uneventful passing of time (“Most of it happened without music/ the clink of a spoon from the kitchen/ someone talking. Silence./ Somebody sleeping. Someone watching somebody sleep.”); how we remember its passing (“Suddenly close and distinct, it seemed finished, as if time were a room/ I could gaze clear across”); and how it can comfort us (“and I ask Billy if I should return the difficult phone call, and he says, yes./ Billy’s already gone through the frightening door,/ whatever he says I’ll do”).
In an interview, Marie Howe says that “poetry holds the knowledge that we are alive and that we know we're going to die. The most mysterious aspect of being alive might be that, and poetry knows that.” The intimate commingling of life with death in What the Living Do achieves this exactly, and one comes out of reading it with a renewed appreciation for everyday life, and the mystery that is present alongside it.
That is not to detract from the fact that there is genuine pain here, pain that gradually creeps in and crescendoes suddenly –– made even more shocking by the ordinariness of its surroundings and alluding to the fact that even these experiences are not unique to Howe but are repeated in a thousand quiet households, their cries silently suppressed. But above all Howe teaches us about death in lines that are powerfully spare and exact: how it changes us (“I had no idea that the gate I would step through/ to finally enter this world/ would be the space my brother’s body made.”); how so much of the process of loss is the uneventful passing of time (“Most of it happened without music/ the clink of a spoon from the kitchen/ someone talking. Silence./ Somebody sleeping. Someone watching somebody sleep.”); how we remember its passing (“Suddenly close and distinct, it seemed finished, as if time were a room/ I could gaze clear across”); and how it can comfort us (“and I ask Billy if I should return the difficult phone call, and he says, yes./ Billy’s already gone through the frightening door,/ whatever he says I’ll do”).
In an interview, Marie Howe says that “poetry holds the knowledge that we are alive and that we know we're going to die. The most mysterious aspect of being alive might be that, and poetry knows that.” The intimate commingling of life with death in What the Living Do achieves this exactly, and one comes out of reading it with a renewed appreciation for everyday life, and the mystery that is present alongside it.
dkrane's review against another edition
5.0
I cherish these poems. Howe makes love and loss specific, real, unadorned, ordinary, and beautiful.
So many gems in here: "What the Living Do," my favorite poem, alongside "How Some of It Happened," "The Last Time,""The Grave," "One of the Last Days," "Watching Television,""Separation," "Prayer," "The Kiss," "Memorial," "My Dead Friends," "Buddy."
Other excellent ones: "The Attic," "The Copper Beach," "The Girl," "For Three Days," "Just Now," "A Certain Light," "Pain," "The Gate," "More."
Re-read on 10/18/19, post-The Great Believers. Perfect.
So many gems in here: "What the Living Do," my favorite poem, alongside "How Some of It Happened," "The Last Time,""The Grave," "One of the Last Days," "Watching Television,""Separation," "Prayer," "The Kiss," "Memorial," "My Dead Friends," "Buddy."
Other excellent ones: "The Attic," "The Copper Beach," "The Girl," "For Three Days," "Just Now," "A Certain Light," "Pain," "The Gate," "More."
Re-read on 10/18/19, post-The Great Believers. Perfect.
mikeybjones's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
reflective
sad
medium-paced
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Alcoholism, Death, and Child abuse
jmutrickster's review against another edition
4.0
4.5 rounded down.
Wonderful poetry pondering what it is to live.
Wonderful poetry pondering what it is to live.
windbreak's review against another edition
4.5
the poem what the living do acutally ruined my life for ever . for ever
monasterymonochrome's review against another edition
3.0
A moving collection of poems, particularly the section about the death of Howe's brother. This takes a very memoir-like approach to poetry, and the style was a little straightforward for my usual taste, so I don't think it's a book I'll necessarily return to, but I appreciated it for what it was, and there were two or three poems especially that will stick with me. I'm not sure why the decision was made to have the title poem be the penultimate piece rather than the final one. To me, the actual final poem was actually one of the weaker ones, and so it ended the book on a bit of a flat note where the title poem seemed like a truer and more memorable culmination of the book's themes.
taratuulikki's review against another edition
5.0
Healing. My biggest takeaway: life, esp monotonous, tedious life like soggy crusts in the sink, is a gift. Out of death comes new life for the still living. “I am living, I remember you.”
kitnotmarlowe's review against another edition
dark
emotional
sad
slow-paced
3.75
oftentimes when i read poetry and think it is merely good, i feel guilty for not having the same transcendental experiences of other readers. obviously this isn't to say that there is a right or wrong way to divine meaning from a piece of art, but i do feel as though something was lacking in my experience. like, it's good poetry! it just didn't make me cry or give me catharsis and leave the lasting emotional impact which it has clearly had on so many other people. it's consistently good, it just never knocked my socks off! i admire the quietness and restraint howe writes with. normally, i like my poetry to be visually striking whether that's in the language used or the way it's arranged. however employing any flashy tricks would have driven the tone and the message of this collection from sombre to maudlin. howe is decidedly unsentimental in her elegy, which is where she succeeds because i have read so many poems about the vastness of death and dying and how it can make people or things or times beautiful in retrospect, but howe's poems moreso focus on the small images of life before, during, and after death. the second section which focuses most directly about the process of her brother's dying is the most uniform in its quality.