The Seventy Prepositions: PoemsCarol Snow's award-winning poetry has been admired and celebrated as "work of difficult beauty" (Robert Hass), "ever restless, ever re-framing the frame of reference" (Boston Review), teaching us "how brutally self-transforming a verbal action can be when undertaken in good faith" (Jorie Graham). In this, her third volume, Snow continues to mine the language to its most mysterious depths and to explore the possibilities its meanings and mechanics hold for definition, transformation, and emotional truth. These poems place us before, and in, language--as we stand before, and in, the world. The Seventy Prepositions comprises three suites of poems. The first, "Vocabulary Sentences," reflects on words and reality by taking as a formal motif the sort of sentences used to test vocabulary skills in elementary school. The poems of the second suite, "Vantage," gather loosely around questions of perspective and perception. The closing suite finds its inspiration in the Japanese dry-landscape gardens known as karesansui, such as the famous rock garden at Ryoan-ji Temple in Kyoto. Here the poet approaches composition as one faces a "miniature Zen garden," choosing and positioning words rather than stones, formally, precisely, evocatively. |
Contents
IX | 31 |
X | 32 |
XI | 35 |
XII | 38 |
XIII | 39 |
XIV | 43 |
XV | 44 |
XVI | 47 |
XVII | 48 |
XVIII | 49 |
XIX | 50 |
XX | 53 |
XXI | 54 |
XXII | 60 |
XXIII | 61 |
XXXII | 74 |
XXXIII | 75 |
XXXIV | 76 |
XXXV | 78 |
XXXVI | 79 |
XXXVII | 80 |
XXXVIII | 82 |
XXXIX | 83 |
XL | 84 |
XLI | 85 |
XLII | 86 |
XLIII | 87 |
XLIV | 97 |
XLV | 99 |
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Common terms and phrases
A. R. Luria Aboard ANNIVERSARY WALTZ Error BASHŌ Book of Serenity Brenda Hillman brutally self-transforming Carol Snow Cascadia Chaim Potok chapter choosing and posi COINED Violinisting comprises three suites Copyright Dialog on Language DREAM SONG 73 dry-landscape garden karesansui EPIGRAPH excerpt Fernando Pessoa Heart once spelled HENRI MATISSE IRMTRAUD SCHAARSCHMIDT-RICHTER Japanese dry landscape JAPANESE GARDENS Jessica Grunwald JOHN BERRYMAN Jorie Graham KARESANSUI known as karesansui KOAN landscape gardens known Laura Mullen LEWIS CARROLL loosely around ques MATSUO BASHŌ miniature Zen garden Oliver Sacks once spelled threat OSAMU MORI Oscar Hammerstein II pallor poet approaches composition Prepositions comprises three re-framing the frame Reprinted by permission rhythm shichigosan Robert Hass Ryoan-ji Temple sand Sappho SCHAARSCHMIDT-RICHTER AND OSAMU self-transforming a verbal Seung Sahn Seventy Prepositions comprises Shattered World Snow's award-winning poetry spelled threat once spelled treat Stevie Smith tences test vocabulary skills thought tions of perspective translated VANTAGE VOCABULARY SENTENCES William Shakespeare York Zaseysky
Popular passages
Page 5 - So, before I could go on and write my story, I had to jot down various words for the names of objects, things, phenomena, ideas. I'd write these down whenever they came to me. Then I'd take the words, sentences, and ideas I'd collected in this way and begin to write my story in a notebook, regrouping the words and sentences, comparing them with others I'd seen in books.
Page 5 - It was so hard to write. ... At last I'd turned up a good idea. So I began to hunt for words to describe it and finally I thought up two. But by the time I got to the third word, I was stuck . . . what a torture it was. I'd always forget what I wanted to write. ... So before I could go on and write my story, I had to jot down various words for the names of objects, things, phenomena, ideas.