Atlanta Review – Spring/Summer 2005
Volume 11 Number 2
Spring/Summer 2005
Sima Rabinowitz
Editor Dan Veach is enthusiastic and proud: “Welcome to the most joyful and enjoyable celebration of poetry you’ve ever seen!” The celebration is nothing short of enormous — 330 pages of poetry divided into a series of “stages of human life” (Birth, Childhood & Youth, Love, etc., Home & Work, Aging & Death, Animals & Nature, Humor, Cities, Poetry, Music and Art, and War) interspersed with a series of “expeditions” (Ireland, Asia, Latin America, Spain, The Caribbean, Africa, Greece, Australia, Great Britain, and America), along with serene black and white drawings from a half dozen artists. Editor Dan Veach is enthusiastic and proud: “Welcome to the most joyful and enjoyable celebration of poetry you’ve ever seen!” The celebration is nothing short of enormous — 330 pages of poetry divided into a series of “stages of human life” (Birth, Childhood & Youth, Love, etc., Home & Work, Aging & Death, Animals & Nature, Humor, Cities, Poetry, Music and Art, and War) interspersed with a series of “expeditions” (Ireland, Asia, Latin America, Spain, The Caribbean, Africa, Greece, Australia, Great Britain, and America), along with serene black and white drawings from a half dozen artists. Poems in the geographically themed sections are by poets from elsewhere who write about these places, as well as by poets from these regions, most writing in English, though there are also several fine translations. Naturally, given the size of the volume, there is a range of styles and modes, though narrative poems predominate. There are some stars here, Seamus Heaney, Rachel Hadas, Maxine Kumin, Stephen Dunn, Charles Wright, Billy Collins, Derek Walcott, Paul Muldoon, but for the most part the anthology features lesser known poets. Highlights include Matthea Harvey’s “Illuminated Manuscript,” Jeanne Wagner’s “What Birds Dream,” “The Conspiracy of Silence,” by Amrita Pritam of India, and a lovely translation of “Evening Edition,” by Jorge Andrade Carrera of Ecuador, translated by Steven Ford Brown. [The Atlanta Review, P.O. Box 8248, Atlanta, GA 31106. E-mail: [email protected]. Single issue $10. www.atlantareview.com] – Sima Rabinowitz