{"id":486,"date":"2017-07-09T21:44:04","date_gmt":"2017-07-10T01:44:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/?p=486"},"modified":"2017-07-09T21:44:04","modified_gmt":"2017-07-10T01:44:04","slug":"review-of-in-the-volcanos-mouth-by-miriam-bird-greenberg","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/?p=486","title":{"rendered":"Review of In the Volcano’s Mouth by Miriam Bird Greenberg"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Miriam Bird Greenberg. In the Volcano\u2019s Mouth. <\/em>University of Pittsburgh Press, 2016. 101 pgs. $15.95.<\/p>\n

The poems in Miriam Bird Greenberg\u2019s first full-length collection, In the Volcano\u2019s Mouth, <\/em>are compelling for both their content and craft, but be warned\u2014the collection is not an easy read. There\u2019s very little safety here, and what safety there is is temporary. The book explores implicit violence, threat, unease, with the reader becoming increasingly apprehensive.<\/p>\n

An early poem, \u201cValediction,\u201d explores the speaker\u2019s childhood memory, of a mother, yes, but also of a much more sinister image. Referencing Octavio Paz, the poem begins,<\/p>\n

My earliest memory<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 is aboard a train, drowsing. My mother<\/p>\n

covers my eyes<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 suddenly with her hand, startling<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

me awake. Light spills<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 between her fingers, then a long shadow,<\/p>\n

hanging from a pole.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Flag of civil<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

wars, swaying<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 on its rope\u2026<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The poem begins comfortably, even nostalgically. But the nostalgia is a decoy, for although the mother does act protectively, the image that follows, \u201ca long shadow, \/ handing from a pole\u201d is horrifying. Greenberg\u2019s attention to the line in this excerpt enhances the effects of the sentences. The second line, for example, reinforces the deceptive hint of nostalgia as \u201cMy mother\u201d is positioned adjacently to the suggestive \u201cdrowsing.\u201d Then the break between lines three and four, with \u201csuddenly\u201d introducing line four, contributes to the abrupt shift. Despite the mother\u2019s attempt to shield her child, the speaker nevertheless glimpses the \u201clong shadow.\u201d The next line, \u201changing from a pole,\u201d one of the few in the poems where a line consists of a single complete grammatical unit, is as disturbing as it is in part because the stark phrase is isolated from other material. Greenberg\u2019s next line\u2014and stanza\u2014break emphasizes the particular disruption of civil wars, when danger arises not from beyond borders but from within them.<\/p>\n

The poem progresses through linked images until we reach the last couple sentences and stanzas. Soldiers, we are told<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 lie<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 asleep as animals<\/p>\n

bedded down<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 at their tethers. One covers<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

the back of his neck<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 with his hand, as if warding off a blow<\/p>\n

in his sleep.<\/p>\n

These concluding sentences recall the opening, when the speaker was nearly asleep and then startled awake in time to perceive the residue of violence. These lines suggest that the world contains no safe space, as even in sleep a man must settle into a posture of defense.<\/p>\n

I admire how this poem proceeds, the experience conveyed subtly yet directly. Its format requires deliberate reading, which permits the content to unfold gently\u2014if gentleness is not too paradoxical for the revelations that ensue.<\/p>\n

Throughout In the Volcano\u2019s Mouth, <\/em>the poems are most often composed in short stanzas, particularly couplets, with some lines indented as in \u201cValediction\u201d above. \u201cHow Loss Inhabits a Body\u201d consists of twenty-three couplets followed by a final single line, with alternating lines indented. Its strategy, however, is quite different from \u201cValediction,\u201d as it opens with a series of imaginative similes responding to the title:<\/p>\n

Like your collar is always turned up.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Like the wind twisting in your ears, conch<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

and cilia. Like the spine of the roof<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 peering behind other roof-spines, green<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

with moss. Like waking up as someone<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 else. Like when you\u2019re having sex, but you\u2019re not<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

quite you; you\u2019re a German woman<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 who can strip and clean an automatic weapon,<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

and reassemble it in the time it takes to fry an egg.<\/p>\n

This poem opens suggestively enough, with loss compared to a chill. References to the body lead to a metaphor in which a body part becomes the vehicle rather than the tenor, \u201cspine of the roof.\u201d The most startling metaphor occurs a few lines later, \u201ca German woman \/ who can strip and clean\u201d not a bed but \u201can automatic weapon, \/ and reassemble it in the time it takes to fry an egg.\u201d Here, Greenberg incorporates a more traditional domestic image, \u201cfry an egg,\u201d to emphasize the most undomestic of skills, \u201cstrip and clean an automatic weapon.\u201d Juxtapositions like this typify Greenberg\u2019s work. They keep the reader nearly constantly off balance, guarded against what might come next, just as the speaker and other characters are.<\/p>\n

The poems in In the Volcano\u2019s Mouth <\/em>are not apocalyptic, but they are ominous. They are set not in the peaceable kingdom but in the bloody and carnivorous world we actually inhabit. This collection won the Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize from the University of Pittsburgh Press, an award it clearly deserves. Greenberg\u2019s voice is already distinctive, and each of these poems calls out for multiple readings.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Miriam Bird Greenberg. In the Volcano\u2019s Mouth. University of Pittsburgh Press, 2016. 101 pgs. $15.95. The poems in Miriam Bird Greenberg\u2019s first full-length collection, In the Volcano\u2019s Mouth, are compelling for both their content and craft, but be warned\u2014the collection is not an easy read. There\u2019s very little safety here, and what safety there is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-486","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-areviewaweek"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/486","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=486"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/486\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":489,"href":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/486\/revisions\/489"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=486"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=486"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lynndomina.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=486"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}