The Ether Dome and Other Poems: New and Selected 1979-1991

Mary Karr chose Allen Grossman for today's (July 27,2008) poetry column in the Washington Post Book World. "The Piano Player Explains Himself" and "The Work" are from The Ether Dome. I had never heard of Grossman, but am a scattered reader of poetry. "The Work" woke me up this Sunday morning. A great awakening--written in 1991 (or earlier), urgently fitting today.

Grossman's poems are rife with ancient brutality and human endurance. There is a mythology at work beneath the raw and violent surface of these humane poems. Grossman indulges and relishes in the ability of the battered spirit to prevail by way of that ancient precept long forgotten by the water-downed souls of the modern world: primal courage. Grossman has pulled back the Ulyssean bow and let loose the avenging arrow upon the lackluster suitors of the modern world. Grossman's poems possess the same quiet rage and humble disguise as Ulysses' return to Ithaca as a beggar. There is a Quixotic spirit here, but the hard blows of life are evident, and these hardships, these pains, form the hard-willed inspiration of Grossman's language. The language coupled with Grossman's inability to surrender to the forces of life produces the genius of Grossman's poetry. As a former student of his at Hopkins, I can only say that he is as great a teacher as he is a poet. Although any student of his must beware of those Achillean ash spears that he hurls when he gets fired up during lectures.

Grossman has often been called a poet's poet, and one of the things that means is that he's very hard to read, very hard to get into, basically difficult. But get over the hurdle, and this is one of the most profound and illuminating books you'll ever read. A ten is an insult. This book deserves a 20, and easily. I read this book in jaw dropped awe. But if you're not up for it, you might as well go for some Charles Simic. :-)