POETRY: Delights & Shadows (2004)

Ted Kooser collects here domestic lyrics in which he tries, sometimes too hard, to highlight what is beautiful about the ordinary. Bordering on self-parody is "A Washing of Hands," which narrates every motion made by a pair of hands under a running faucet. Still, in this volume of modest "aha"s about rural Midwestern life, there is a gem or two. I give you the ending of "Mother," in which he mourns a parent dead for the past month:

You asked me if I would be sad when it happened

and I am sad. But the iris I moved from your house
now hold in the dusty dry fists of their roots
green knives and forks as if waiting for dinner,
as if spring were a feast. I thank you for that.
Were it not for the way you taught me to look
at the world, to see the life at play in everything,
I would have to be lonely forever.

These lines are so lovely that, by themselves, they compelled me to finish the entire book looking for something else quite as worthwhile. I found only the fresh and successful conceit of "Tectonics," which I'll quote in full:

In only a few months
there begin to be fissures
in what we remember,
and within a year or two,
the facts break apart
one from another
and slowly begin to shift
and turn, grinding,
pushing up over each other
until their shapes
have been changed
and the past has become
a new world.
And after many years,
even a love affair,
one lush green island
all to itself,
perfectly detailed
with even a candle
softly lighting a smile,
may slide under the waves
like Atlantis,
scarcely rippling the heart.

A playful extended metaphor recalling the Metaphysicals is used to elevate an unusual and sad truth that we know too well--that even the most epic and passionate love affair leaves barely a mark on the memory once years have passed. The shape of the poem itself alludes to Pangaea.