Cate neatly captures the stoicism and laconic attitude of country people. I worked with farmers and their animals for the first 30 years of my professional life and know well the kind of people who leave the town photographic competition for:
"the long drive home,
to the big bone-dry expanse of land beyond salvaging
with a second prize certificate
and so few words between them
no speaking up
no protest or complaint
no claim of being wronged, or misrepresented"
She slips her knife of words between readers' complacency and piety in poems about contemporary issues. Irish commissioners too busy eating their dinner to save starving famine victims at their door are compared to our current treatment of refugees in her clever The Poor Commissioners.
"But they are with us,
trudging with the last of their energy,
thousands of miles now, from poorhouses and famine fields,
chilled and exiled, holding pitchforks or children
or unsigned paperwork,
forged, faded identifications, the wrong currencies,
they are with us and we will not see them
as they come through the valley,
spurred by a mirage of lit windows
and laughable hopes of some borrowed hearth,
they are with us, and we are done with them,
we will not meet their eyes."
Every word works to draw us in and make us culpable. The language, alliterations ('forged, faded identifications'), repetitions of phrases ('they are with us'), and metaphors reinforced with the marching rhythm skilfully lead us on.
This is an excellent and consistent collection of poetry available in e-book or hard copy from Kobo.
No comments:
Post a Comment