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A review by richardwells
Braided Creek by Jim Harrison
5.0
An easy 5 stars. This is a book I could carry around for a few months. It's certainly not going on my actual shelves any time soon. Two old poets hold forth in short spurts. If you like like haiku, or asian verse, and if you'd like to know how the American idiom can comfortably extend the forms this is the book for you. If you'd like a master class in writing but hate the how-to books, this is for you.
Here's what: this book can teach you how to see, and it can teach you how to think about what you've seen, and it can teach you how to write about both. That's big stuff, but not only that, there's at least one gem on every page. Here are a few, at random:
The old hen scratches
then looks, scratches then looks.
My life.
In my garden
the late sun glows
through a rabbit's ears.
How can it be
that everyone my age
is older than I?
A nephew rubs the sore feet
of his aunt,
and the rope that lifts us all toward grace
creaks in the pulley.
Like I said, big stuff.
Here's what: this book can teach you how to see, and it can teach you how to think about what you've seen, and it can teach you how to write about both. That's big stuff, but not only that, there's at least one gem on every page. Here are a few, at random:
The old hen scratches
then looks, scratches then looks.
My life.
In my garden
the late sun glows
through a rabbit's ears.
How can it be
that everyone my age
is older than I?
A nephew rubs the sore feet
of his aunt,
and the rope that lifts us all toward grace
creaks in the pulley.
Like I said, big stuff.