New and Selected Poems, Volume One
by Mary Oliver
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Book Summary Information
Author: Mary OliverEdition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2005-11-15
ISBN: 0807068780
Number of pages: 272
Publisher: Beacon Press
Book Reviews of New and Selected Poems, Volume One
Book Review: Poems that are tender and profound.
Summary: 5 Stars
The best poems say with words that which can't be said with words. I know that sounds like double-talk, but it's true. The best poems act as catalysts, creating emotions and connections in us that the words taken by themselves just don't convey. For example, veteran poet Mary Oliver's poem "Rain" (the first in her "New and Selected Poems, Volume One") opens with "All afternoon it rained, then / such power came down from the clouds / on a yellow thread, / as authoritative as God is supposed to be. / When it hit the tree, her body / opened forever." Beautiful, profound, and any attempt at explanation effectively kills the poetry.
Mary Olver's poems are like that: clear imagery, simple language, common themes brought together like "power . . . on a yellow thread" that packs a wallop. How's THIS for a brightly-lit thought: "Is the soul solid, like iron? / Or is it tender and breakable, like / the wings of a moth in the beak of the owl?"
And this seasoned poet has a few observations about life to share with us: "You do not have to be good. / You do not have to walk on your knees / for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting. / You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves."
I've already ordered her "New and Selected Poems, Volume Two."
Summary of New and Selected Poems, Volume One
When New and Selected Poems, Volume One was originally published in 1992, Mary Oliver was awarded the National Book Award. In the fourteen years since its initial appearance it has become one of the best-selling volumes of poetry in the country. This collection features thirty poems published only in this volume as well as selections from the poet's first eight books.Mary Oliver's perceptive, brilliantly crafted poems about the natural landscape and the fundamental questions of life and death have won high praise from critics and readers alike. "Do you love this world?" she interrupts a poem about peonies to ask the reader. "Do you cherish your humble and silky life?" She makes us see the extraordinary in our everyday lives, how something as common as light can be "an invitation/to happiness,/and that happiness,/when it's done right,/is a kind of holiness,/palpable and redemptive." She illuminates how a near miss with an alligator can be the catalyst for seeing the world "as if for the second time/the way it really is." Oliver's passionate demonstrations of delight are powerful reminders of the bond between every individual, all living things, and the natural world.
As Diane Wakoski has noted, the power of Mary Oliver's Frost-influenced pastoral writing is in her ability to cast a spell, to create "the illusion that the natural world is graspable." Oliver's fierce independence, beautiful imagery, and love and knowledge of the natural world are all driven by a searching mind, expressed in poems that make for good company. In Some Questions You Might Ask, Oliver gives us this one to chew over: "Is the soul solid, like iron?/ or is it tender and breakable, like/ the wings of a moth in the beak of an owl?" Highly recommended.
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