EILEEN TABIOS Engages
Dear Almost by Matthew
Thorburn
(Louisiana University Press, Baton Rouge, 2016)
The concept is bludgeoning: Dear Almost is a book-length poem
written by Matthew Thorburn to reflect a year-long journey of grieving and
meditating over an unborn child. It’s painful for me to even summarize the
book, but the author’s and publisher’s book description works well for this
purpose:
Dear Almost is a book-length poem addressed to an unborn child
lost in miscarriage. Beginning with the hope and promise of springtime, the
poet traces the course of a year with sections set in each of the four seasons.
Part book of days, part meditative prayer, part travelogue, the poem details a
would-be father’s wanderings through the figurative landscapes of memory and
imagination as well as the literal landscapes of the Bronx, Shanghai, suburban
New Jersey, and the Japanese island of Miyajima.
As
the speaker navigates his days, he attempts to show his unborn daughter “what
life is like / here where you ought to be / with us, but aren’t.” His
experiences recall other deaths and uncover the different ways we remember and
forget. Grief forces him to consider a question he never imagined asking: how
do you mourn for someone you loved but never truly knew, never met or saw? In
candid, meditative verse, Dear Almost seeks to resolve this painful
question, honoring the memory of a child who both was and wasn’t there.
The anguished roots of the
poem highlight the achievements of Dear
Almost for presenting a poem which narratively travels far and wide and yet
makes all elements relate to the poet’s unborn daughter—and Thorburn does so in
controlled and luminous words:
So
give me a sign if
you’re
out there, if you’re
the
light swaying, swinging
between
trees, that light
growing
faint, drifting deeper
into
the shadowy woods,
if
you’re that pale glow
between
the elms and alders.
What
star do you steer by?
Where
are you going?
Tell
me you can hear this
if
that’s you who pauses
beside
a ragged oak,
head
cocked to one side
like
a doe, light bouncing back
from
your dark eyes
if
that’s you moving under
starlight
and moonlight,
waiting
for a gauze of cloud
to
dim the world
Here’s another excerpt:
Lily
says when
I
come home, “and un-
satisfying,
isn’t it?
To
hurt like this for someone
we
never met?” She turns
off
the water, wipes her hands
with
the yellow towel.
“But
here we are, hurting for
someone
we never met.”
I
think what we’ve lost
is
imagination—the soft glimmer
of
possibility, that hum
in
the belly (this part I don’t say
out
loud), the lightness
I
remember feeling each day
during
that little while
when
sarcasm and irony
and
even the last bit of bitterness
had
all fallen away
so
that it felt like gravity
had
been dialed down just for us.
The poem/book also divides
itself into sections relating to the four seasons, and the poet’s deftness can
be seen in how each section's emotional tenor relates to its corresponding season. As examples,
below are the (page-)openings to the “The Light That Lasts All Summer” and
“Three Deer Beneath the Autumn Moon.” (Click on images to enlarge.)
For Summer:
For Autumn:
I am sharing excerpts
because I notice the superb—and lovely—quality of the writing yet don’t want to
look at the words as a “reviewer.” What I can share is that Dear Almost compelled me to respond with
my own poem--perhaps the highest compliment a reader-writer can bestow upon what is read. Here it is below—I wrote it “for Matthew Thorburn for writing Dear Almost”—a poem that began as it
continued from my reading of his book’s last page:
From
The Ashbery Riff-Offs
Witnessed in the Convex Mirror: No(t)
Words
That
is the tune but there are no words
like
the fall of snow when it is gentle
thus,
slow—a pace that also eases
the
velocity of the world so that your mind
can
linger over the last kiss you care
-fully
placed on your Dad’s cheek as
he
laid, eyes closed, on his deathbed
and
on your baby’s brow before you
drew
back to watch her soul join your
waiting
father’s. He is your Dad, thus
knows
to whisper as a song from
a
bird suddenly alit by the open window
“Your
child will not be alone, and we
will
wait for you to join us.” That is
the
tune that clenched your heart, then
released
it to mirror the span of the sky
Yes, my poem includes a
reference to “Dad,” as Dear Almost
also moved me to remember loved ones who've passed, such as my father. That result
speaks to the power of Thorburn’s poem, and creates the paradoxical result of
saddening me as well as making me grateful for the grief.
My condolences to Matthew
Thorburn and his family. I wish you had not had to write this book. But as the
book is written, I recommend it.
*****
Eileen Tabios is the editor of Galatea Resurrects. Her 2017 poetry releases include two books, two booklets and six poetry chaps. The latter includes a new fundraising chap, MARAWI, co-authored with Albert Alejo. Forthcoming later this fall is a new poetry collection, MANHATTAN: An Archaeology (Paloma Press). She does not let her books be reviewed by Galatea Resurrects because she's its editor, but she is pleased to point you elsewhere for a recent review of her work: M. Earl Smith reviews Excavating the Filipino In Me for The FilAm Magazine! More info about her work at http://eileenrtabios.com
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