The poet Brian Kim Stefans, a favorite here at LH, has written a review of W.S. Graham's New Collected Poems that makes me want to run out and buy it. I was not familiar with Graham, but this five-line snippet, all by itself, tells me I'm in the presence of a major talent:
YesterdayRead the longer excerpts quoted by Stefans and see what you think. (Warning: occasional use of Scots dialect. Also, there seems to have been an HTML glitch that caused a large chunk of the review to be repeated; when you finish the poem beginning "Who is that poor sea-scholar," scroll down until you get past its second occurrence and begin reading at the next paragraph, "In general, Graham’s poems favor the cyclic over the linear...")
I heard the telephone ringing deep
Down in a blue crevasse.
I did not answer it and could
Hardly bear to pass.
(Via wood s lot, which I have to thank for pointing me to Stefans in the first place.)
Posted by languagehat at April 20, 2005 10:44 AMGraham is terrific. "What is the language using us for?" Just terrific. His letters, selected as "The Nightfisherman" were published by Carcanet a few years ago, and are well worth reading too if you can track down a copy.
Posted by: dave at April 20, 2005 01:55 PM