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Belonging, Longing, Being, Beginnings in Gilbert's Poems

Belongings: Poems
Sandra M. Gilbert
Manufacturer: W. W. Norton
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Book Description

An ambitious, intricately wrought corona of sonnets ponders the nature of belonging in every sense of the word.

Belongings as possessions, as the history and furnishings of a life, and as the places in which life itself happens are the preoccupations at the heart of this affecting collection. Moving from memories of a childhood apartment to mourning for the poet's mother, Belongings explores the question: "Where, how, and to what do you belong?

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Belonging, Longing, Being, Beginnings in Gilbert's Poems.......2006-06-08

Yes--"Belongings explores the question: Where, how, and to what do you belong?" in its four sections: I. Belongings;II. A Little Night Music; III. Four Masks; IV. A Year and A Day. Finally reading Sandra Gilbert's poetry after reading her gathering of elegies in "Inventions of Farewell," and her incisive synthesis of modern mourning in "Death's Door," I come to this collection with a clearer eye to what drives her--her occupations and pre-occupations.

It's a travel log of sorts. We listen to jazz at Yoshi's in Berkeley, savor cafe life in the Marais District in Paris, learn about the true nature of mosquitos in St. Petersburg, touch down in Sicily--point of origin, take an afternoon walk at The Sea Ranch on the Mendocino Coast.

Yet, at its heart, I feel the collection in its markings of losses and longings cuts deeper into the vast canyon of the elegaic tradition that Gilbert illuminates so well in her two books mentioned above.

Gilbert is ever searching to solve the puzzle of spirit within the material world--and wanting to mend any impending split.

"What happens to belongings after the grave?
They'll be up here and she--she'll be down there
what of the stuff she worked so hard to have?
. . . don't let my belongings go astray. . . " (P. 23)

Gilbert ends the tour de force of her closing section "A Year and A Day" with the hopeful poem of potentiality, "The New Tree"

". . . purple leaves that haven't happened yet,
though somewhere in, or under, the flayed thin
skin of the new tree they wait and plan."

Maybe, in the end, it is to the beginnings that we belong.

--Janet Grace Riehl, author "Sightlines: A Poet's Diary"

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Lasting Treasures and Subtle Surprises

Belonging: Poems
Dick Davis
Manufacturer: Swallow Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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A Trick of Sunlight: Poems
Devices and Desires: New and Selected Poems 1967-1987

ASIN: 0804010420

Customer Reviews:

Lasting Treasures and Subtle Surprises.......2004-05-09

I have lived with Dick Davis's book, BELONGING, for over two years, and still savor the riches of its pages with undiminished satisfaction and enthusiasm. Unlike most collections, which, after one reading, go stale on the shelf and make me wonder why I keep them, Dick Davis's poems do not lose their crisp freshness and power to please. The work flows from a startlingly sharp intellect that knows how to slice experience and knowledge along the grain with a clean blade and a sure, formal stroke, leaving breathtakingly precise sections of history, legend, autobiography, observation, and reflection, flavored with human warmth and frailty and a salty, elegant wit.

Take, for example, the sorrowfully resigned ending of "Political Asylum," written in the voice a man who has left a turbulent homeland to seek refuge in America:

I've tried to write, but what is there to say?
My friends were killed and this is now my life;
It's almost certain this is where we'll stay.
We like it here, especially my wife.

Biting irony and heavy tenderness blend smoothly in Davis's verses. In "Farewell to the Mentors," he laments the inability of the poets he most reveres and follows, to help him cope with his teenage daughters:

And though you're great on Weltschmerz, loss,
Lust, irony, old age,
I draw a blank when looking for
Advice on teenage rage;

On sibling rivalry and rows
I can't begin to rate you,
You're silent when it comes to screams
Of "Dad, I really hate you."

There are edifying, revelatory surprises and treasures on every page. To mention only a few, don't miss "Duchy and Shinks," a sonnet about two maiden aunts; "Sweet Pleasure..." a superbly brief poem about the impermanence of Pleasure and the relentlessness of Duty; "Hibernation," three immaculate couplets on lost love; "No Going Back," the influence of the poet's mother on his taste in music; "Secrets" and "Out of Time," terse stanzas of family tragedy; "Just a Small One" and "At the Reception," marvellously accurate, jaded, and timeless views of social manners.

In short, readers shouldn't bother searching any further for reviews of this excellent book. I recommend owning it at once. Its challenges and pleasures gratify and endure.

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Belonging: Poems
Sandy Shreve
Manufacturer: Sono Nis Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

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Rent This Room: A Book of Poems

Manufacturer: J. Publishing/R.P Graphics, CA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: 096789123X

Product Description

"Rent This Room" is a wonderfully rich and engaging volume--a collection of poems that give fresh voice to the nuanced joys, struggles and wonder of human being amidst a diverse range of contexts...a lyrical journery which traverses many landscapes while probing the contours of heart, mind and soul in remarkably insightful ways. Brad Berky, Assistant Professor of Urban Studies, Westmont College

William Blake's designs for Gray's poems, reproduced full-size in monochrome or colour from the unique copy belonging to His Grace the Duke of Hamilton

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William Blake's designs for Gray's poems, reproduced full-size in monochrome or colour from the unique copy belonging to His Grace the Duke of Hamilton
William Blake
Manufacturer: H. Milford
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding
ASIN: B0008C6SYM

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Pass the Duende, Please

Nightshift Belonging to Lorca
Sean Thomas Dougherty
Manufacturer: Mammoth Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Poetry | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0971805997

Book Description

Steeped in the experiential world, often formal and experimental in the same breath, award winning performance poet Sean Thomas Dougherty's sixth book offers the reader a mix of brief stanzas, canzones, prose poems, and textured performance monologues, continuing the exploration of diverse and seemingly contradictory strategies of lyricism begun in his earlier collections. Evoking the ghost of the great Andalusian poet Federico Garcia Lorca, Dougherty replants Lorca in a conversation with Rumi at an Erie State Park, up late arguing with Tu Fu, and streaming black tears and laughing at some sudden recollection. In poem after poem of work, class, neighborhood, and love, Dougherty evokes for the reader an often blue collar world, rendered in exquisite urban metaphors. While so much contemporary poetry loses itself in language, Dougherty urges us to "consider the lungs of the accoridon. All around you the living are telling radiant jokes, or weeping for something to eat.

Customer Reviews:

Pass the Duende, Please.......2004-12-08

For those who bemaon the death of poetry, this book might let them know that poetry still has a lot of soul, of what Lorca called duende. Traversing all sorts of poetic styles--from traditional forms to short free verse lyrics to prose poems--these are poems with a bit of funk, a lot of heart, and a great ear. Dougherty is able to capture the right bit of working class (the nightshift) and the scholarly (Lorca), and find where the two meet--in poetry, yes, surely; but also in love, in music, in dreaming. This is poetry that dares someone to say the artform is dead or unimportant.

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Ways of Belonging: Selected Poems
Eunice De Souza
Manufacturer: Polygon
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000M23OWW

Belongings.(Poem): An article from: Poetry

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Belongings.(Poem): An article from: Poetry
Sandra M. Gilbert
Manufacturer: Modern Poetry Association
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital

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Poetry | Writing | Reference | Subjects | Books

Book Description

This digital document is an article from Poetry, published by Modern Poetry Association on May 1, 2002. The length of the article is 1693 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Belongings.(Poem)
Author: Sandra M. Gilbert
Publication: Poetry (Refereed)
Date: May 1, 2002
Publisher: Modern Poetry Association
Volume: 180 Issue: 2 Page: 63(9)

Article Type: Poem

Distributed by Thomson Gale

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Belonging: Poems
Lenore M Coberly
Manufacturer: Fireweed Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding
ASIN: B0006EVUOA

Ways of Belonging: Selected Poems (Poetry)

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Ways of Belonging: Selected Poems (Poetry)
Eunice De Souza
Manufacturer: Edinburgh University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Anthologies | Poetry | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

General | Poetry | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0748660410

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