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Field – Spring 2005

Contemporary Poetry and Poetics

Number 72

Spring 2005

Kathe Lison

Field: (f?ld) n. any wide, unbroken expanse; in this case, one of terrific poetry. But longtime readers of the venerable journal, in publication since the 60’s, won’t find that news revelatory. As usual, there’s much here to be praised, with new work by notables such as Pattiann Rogers, Marianne Boruch, Dennis Schmitz and Sandra McPherson.

Field: (f?ld) n. any wide, unbroken expanse; in this case, one of terrific poetry. But longtime readers of the venerable journal, in publication since the 60’s, won’t find that news revelatory. As usual, there’s much here to be praised, with new work by notables such as Pattiann Rogers, Marianne Boruch, Dennis Schmitz and Sandra McPherson. Most appealing to this reader, however, were two lovely poems by Kevin Prufer “Gothic: Leaves” and “The Pastor;” the former made me long for the autumn leaf piles of my Midwestern childhood. I read associate editor David Young’s review of the Donald Justice’s Collected Poems, posthumously published by Knopf (Justice died just days before its appearance), with great interest, intrigued by his observations on how the art of translation can feed a poet’s work (it didn’t hurt that Young himself is one of my favorite translators). But the highlight of this issue was four poems by Franz Wright. He may have come in for some roasting in the “Letters to the Editor” section of the May issue of Poetry–or, rather, roasted himself, depending on one’s point of view–but he’s still a damn fine poet. And this is a damned fine issue of Field. [www.oberlin.edu/ocpress] – Kathe Lison

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