The new issue of Valparaiso Poetry Review, released this month, includes a review by Nick Ripatrazone of Alison Stine’s second collection of poetry, Wait.
ALISON STINE: WAIT
We know that charged whispers can be louder than screams, and the same goes for poetry. Wait, Alison Stine’s second collection of poems, is not a muted book; rather, a carefully calculated arrangement from a poet well aware of the need for the pacing of pitch. Several of the 38 poems in this book span two pages, and Stine’s talent for architecture is clear: her attention to threading sentences across lines feels more careful than deliberate. The result is authentic narrative poems, and a wholly singular, hauntingly pastoral vision.
The title poem is written in the collective voice, and is a useful introduction to the book: Wait feels like a text composed of different perspectives, and yet they all reside within a similar tone. There is a clear dialogue between the sexes, a place where “men / called but could not find us.” Stine’s play with “wait” is rich. A curious verb, it at once represents the current action of anticipation yet requires the future condition of expectation. What is the point of waiting if one is not found?
Wait chronicles the year leading to a woman’s marriage, though that through-line is fleshed with the eccentric characters and narratives of the setting....
I invite visitors to examine the entire review of Alison Stine’s book, as well as to read the rest of Valparaiso Poetry Review’s Fall/Winter 2011-2012 issue, the journal’s 25th issue.
We know that charged whispers can be louder than screams, and the same goes for poetry. Wait, Alison Stine’s second collection of poems, is not a muted book; rather, a carefully calculated arrangement from a poet well aware of the need for the pacing of pitch. Several of the 38 poems in this book span two pages, and Stine’s talent for architecture is clear: her attention to threading sentences across lines feels more careful than deliberate. The result is authentic narrative poems, and a wholly singular, hauntingly pastoral vision.
The title poem is written in the collective voice, and is a useful introduction to the book: Wait feels like a text composed of different perspectives, and yet they all reside within a similar tone. There is a clear dialogue between the sexes, a place where “men / called but could not find us.” Stine’s play with “wait” is rich. A curious verb, it at once represents the current action of anticipation yet requires the future condition of expectation. What is the point of waiting if one is not found?
Wait chronicles the year leading to a woman’s marriage, though that through-line is fleshed with the eccentric characters and narratives of the setting....
I invite visitors to examine the entire review of Alison Stine’s book, as well as to read the rest of Valparaiso Poetry Review’s Fall/Winter 2011-2012 issue, the journal’s 25th issue.
No comments:
Post a Comment