Worldly Country, A
New Poems
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Publisher Description
Thrill of a Romance
It's different when you have hiccups.
Everything is—so many glad hands competing
for your attention, a scarf, a puff of soot,
or just a blast of silence from a radio.
What is it? That's for you to learn
to your dismay when, at the end of a long queue
in the cafeteria, tray in hand, they tell you the gate closed down
after the Second World War. Syracuse was declared capital
of a nation in malaise, but the directorate
had other, hidden goals. To proclaim logic
a casualty of truth was one.
Everyone's solitude (and resulting promiscuity)
perfumed the byways of villages we had thought civilized.
I saw you waiting for a streetcar and pressed forward.
Alas, you were only a child in armor. Now when ribald toasts
sail round a table too fair laid out, why the consequences
are only dust, disease and old age. Pleasant memories
are just that. So I channel whatever
into my contingency, a vein of mercury
that keeps breaking out, higher up, more on time
every time. Dirndls spotted with obsolete flowers,
worn in the city again, promote open discussion.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
If Ashbery's last several books have tended to sound the same, it could be because they indicate a restlessness to express something that won't quite come out, "a murky, milky precipitate/ of certain years." In the 58 lyrics of his 26th book of poems, Ashbery (Where Shall I Wander, 2005) shows his complete mastery of his late idiom: associative leaps ("Everything has a silver lining; it's a matter/ of turning it over and scrubbing some sense into it"), flippant philosophical statements ("Much will be forgiven those/ on whom nothing has dawned") and chatty quips ("I say, would you mind if I light up in bars?"). Surprises include the cleverly rhymed title poem and a lovely metaphysical piece called "Litanies": "It is important to be laid out/ in a man-made shape. Others will try/ to offer you something on no account/ accept it." There is no trademark long poem, but many of these short pieces forebodingly acknowledge that "the dark/ wants, needs us." While the mood elsewhere in this book often seems light, these poems are more about the failure of, or provisional failure of, lightness. Still inimitably questioning, Ashbery continues to inhabit a worldly country all his own.
