North Point North: New and Selected Poems

This poet reminds me of John Ashbery-not a bad thing! Although many of the (human) themes are familiar to me, Koethe's treatment is beautifully complex and deepening. He spins a "universal" theme, such as youth, with original metaphor and intellect and consciousness, which I attribute to his intelligence and maturity as much as I do to his craft (a precise, almost meticulous endeavor, from the looks of it). As for the way he puts a thing onto paper... Wow. Some of his lines are so fresh, so powerful. For an example of the immense power of line, check out the first stanza of "In the Park". PROS: Unflinching devotion to sobriety. No saccharine stuff, here. A really intelligent, absorbing, hefty book.

John Koethe is a professor of philosophy; one comes to his work expecting a good dose of philosophy and one is not disappointed. The poems in "North Point North" are wistful, and sad. They are somehow both removed and concrete. The author has included special notes on their chronology. The images in the earlier ones are more evocative, more substantial, than in the later ones. Time and memory are important themes. For the average reader, the value in these poems will be that they echo those periods when each of us feels hopeless, listless or unconnected. We felt that way even when we were young--if we stopped long enough to consider our emotions then-and their presence becomes more pronounced as we age. If we follow Koethe's lead, we will not deny these thoughts-then and now, now and then--for who are we if not what we think? Koethe himself says "disappointment surrounds these poems." And yet there is enlightenment in this book because his poetry is proof that when we think these thoughts, we are not alone. In spite of the melancholy, "North Point North" is an affirmation. Koethe also says that words "still pass (es) for celebration..." In the words between the covers of this book, there is a both an absence of celebration and a commemoration. Funny how a poet/philosopher can do that. Deny the very thing he is confirming.Carolyn Howard-Johnson, author of "This is the Place"