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A review by sloatsj
Seeing Birds in Church Is a Kind of Adieu by Arlene Ang
5.0
[b:Seeing Birds in Church is a Kind of Adieu|7253482|Seeing Birds in Church is a Kind of Adieu|Arlene Ang|http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51cpViwhFbL._SL75_.jpg|8294031] deals chiefly with death and loss and bereavement. Some of the poems seem to set out to be playful or simply surreal but at some point in each one - if not from the get-go - you're reading about loss, which is no fun at all. Still, Ang has an imagination that gives her poetry great appeal despite its sometimes heavy burden.
In most cases, the death/loss poems have to do with the death and/or dying of the mother, although sometimes it's someone else, a husband or wife maybe, or father.
Here’s the beginning of “Underworld” –
It takes a minute to climb the roof.
The ladder is spiked with splinters that waylay
the hands. Once at the top,
you use your teeth to extract them from your skin.
The gathering dusk squeezes
he farmhouse into another world.
Ten yards out,
an abandoned forklift becomes an object
someone else is seeing
tor the last time. if you could suck
the sting from your fingers,
would you have done the same
for your mother?
I like the surprises in there, the forklift “someone else is seeing / for the last time,” and the question that shifts to the mother, who is suddenly the center of the poem, then just as quickly absent again.
Then there’s the poem “5:37 p.m.,” and Arthur:
Arthur’s hour of death was 5:37 p.m.
And now 5:37 p.m. is Arthur. I am powerless,
like when you fall asleep and the house
fails to exist. Every day I step into 5:37 pm.
clapping my hands to annouce
my presence. I am the intruder here.
The body is a strong presence in the poem, the body or its parts or its stand-ins, like fruit or a house or a reflection.
Here’s the beginning of “Surface:”
The house grows out of the ground
like a head. Even its porch is an exercise
in attachment.
One of my favorite poems is “This is not the first time you tasted sand,” which I admire for its surreality. It can be read at FriGG: http://www.friggmagazine.com/volumeonearchive/sand.htm
Unfortunately most of my other favorites I couldn’t find links for, like “Dead Girl Found Curled Up In Snow” and “A Sun That Isn’t A Source Of Heat.”
Here are some other links:
“Col San Martino” in Umbrella: http://www.umbrellajournal.com/winter2007/poetry/ArleneAng.html
“This Closing Book” and “Something Like Blood” in Ghoti: http://www.ghotimag.com/archives/issue5/Ang.htm
In most cases, the death/loss poems have to do with the death and/or dying of the mother, although sometimes it's someone else, a husband or wife maybe, or father.
Here’s the beginning of “Underworld” –
It takes a minute to climb the roof.
The ladder is spiked with splinters that waylay
the hands. Once at the top,
you use your teeth to extract them from your skin.
The gathering dusk squeezes
he farmhouse into another world.
Ten yards out,
an abandoned forklift becomes an object
someone else is seeing
tor the last time. if you could suck
the sting from your fingers,
would you have done the same
for your mother?
I like the surprises in there, the forklift “someone else is seeing / for the last time,” and the question that shifts to the mother, who is suddenly the center of the poem, then just as quickly absent again.
Then there’s the poem “5:37 p.m.,” and Arthur:
Arthur’s hour of death was 5:37 p.m.
And now 5:37 p.m. is Arthur. I am powerless,
like when you fall asleep and the house
fails to exist. Every day I step into 5:37 pm.
clapping my hands to annouce
my presence. I am the intruder here.
The body is a strong presence in the poem, the body or its parts or its stand-ins, like fruit or a house or a reflection.
Here’s the beginning of “Surface:”
The house grows out of the ground
like a head. Even its porch is an exercise
in attachment.
One of my favorite poems is “This is not the first time you tasted sand,” which I admire for its surreality. It can be read at FriGG: http://www.friggmagazine.com/volumeonearchive/sand.htm
Unfortunately most of my other favorites I couldn’t find links for, like “Dead Girl Found Curled Up In Snow” and “A Sun That Isn’t A Source Of Heat.”
Here are some other links:
“Col San Martino” in Umbrella: http://www.umbrellajournal.com/winter2007/poetry/ArleneAng.html
“This Closing Book” and “Something Like Blood” in Ghoti: http://www.ghotimag.com/archives/issue5/Ang.htm