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PolderChris McCully
Categories: 21st Century, British
Imprint: Carcanet Poetry Publisher: Carcanet Press Available as: Paperback (96 pages) (Pub. Jul 2009) 9781847770172 Out of Stock
the air
fills oyster shells with snow; you’re borne by weeks of earth and ice; and deep under the Amsteldijk carp sleep. from ‘Murdering the Sea’
Polder begins with extinction. The dust that existed from the first instant of creation is the dust to which in the end all creation will return, ‘sinking under its weight’. The prose-poem ‘Dust’ was written when the poet was being treated for alcoholism and began the process of recovery. The collection ends with poems addressed to Torquatus, friend of the Roman poet Horace, a dialogue across centuries that defies the dust and looks back with mixed feelings to the drinking days of ambition, pride, and failure – and celebrates the poet’s fiftieth birthday.
In between are other conversations. In 2000 McCully moved to Amsterdam and began to explore the Dutch landscapes, dialects and culture that animate the second section of Polder with faces and voices past and present. In the third, ‘Masterpieces’, works by Vermeer, Rembrandt and other artists displayed in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, are engaged in dialogues that range from the quizzical to the confrontational. The poet tries to find firm ground in a fragile landscape reclaimed from the hungry sea, a home in a place that is not yet home.
Contents
I Dust II Polder Over and Out Polder Mindful of Holland Islands Remembering Indo-European The Thorn Carol A Curtal at Old Year’s Eve Murdering the Sea A Walk to Kleine Loopveld Camellia When for Anyone On Greenfield Station An Auction for Amsterdam Minoan Pronouns Caribbean Shorts The Bough Eating the Spring Looking at Orion Curlew Bananas Black Tulips Ithaka A Tourist on Waterlooplein The Night Visitor The February Fences Summer Sundays Counting the Lightning Geese at Vinkeveen An Epitaph The Fat Girl The Wooden Bird Smoke from the Vatican Birdsong Fado The Gravy People After Beowulf From West of Eden for clive /s/ cott William of Normandy Perplexity Witness III Masterpieces The Mill The Drinker Woman Reading a Letter in Blue The Problem with Virtually any Self-Portrait The Bleaching Fields Old Woman Reading The Storm Fishing in the River of Souls Skaters Happy Families IV Torquatus Horace in the Sabine Hills A Letter to Torquatus The Boy Poppies Verbena Bed March in June Trade Days Ochre Sherbet The Senator A Reply to Virtue Raking Roads On a Request for New Material The Peon Rose Sand The Visitor The Vinegar Days
Praise for Chris McCully
'His verse is crisp and propulsive... At its best, McCully's translation is clear and readable, hitting the beats of Old English metre, and offering punchy phrases'
Caroline Batten and Charles Tolkien-Gillet, Translation and Literature 'This is a commendable and exhilarating book, McCully admirably bringing to life the world of honour, weirdness and creatures beyond our ken.' Anthony Clay, Chase 'McCully gets the life of words, their swing and weight, resonance and cadence. The poems spark with great lines and phrases...' Literary Review 'This is a singular collection from a singular voice in English poetry, and I highly commend it.' Phillip Quinlan, Angle |
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