Tell Me Again How the White Heron Rises. ...: Poetry

Hayden Carruth, Tell Me Again How the White Heron Rises Across the Nacreous River at Twilight Towards the Distant Islands (New Directions, 1990) I was of the opinion for many years that Hayden Carruth was America's finest living poet. These days, he still ranks, but I often find him more frustrating than anything. He's always straddling the line between real poetry and that vague prose-broken-up-into-lines that is only poetry when maybe a tenth of a percent of writers dabble in it. The first section of Tell Me Again is full of failed experiments in attempts at vagueness. Value-words, as opposed to images, abound. Not to say there aren't a few successes, but the majority of them are very much prose broken up into lines. Then comes the second section, and all that goes away. One long poem on the death of his mother, Carruth retreats to where all good poets find their best work; the image. It would, for most people, be impossible to write a poem on such an event (especially one as long as this) without straying into the land of judgment and value, and to be sure, Carruth does on a number of occasions. But here, it works, and I can't for the life of me figure out why. Maybe it's because the poem is so rooted in memories (which are, of course, naked image). "Mother" is another of those poems written that make Carruth sound as if he could do no wrong ("Ray," written soon after this, is another; it can be found in Collected Shorter Poems, 1946-1991, and is must reading for any Carruth fan who's never had the pleasure). But rather than there really being a high pint of his career (if he had one, the late eighties and early nineties would be it), this seems another example of Carruth's ability to let fly with a real monster every once in a while, an ability that has stayed with him throughout his career, from the earliest books to the most recent. Hayden Carruth is without doubt a fine author. Tell Me Again is a good book, certainly better than 99% of the books of poetry out there. But what makes is worth seeking out and buying is "Mother," the long poem that comprises the book's second section. A definite must-read. *** ½