What Diamonds Can Do Claire Keyes 9781625491282 Books
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"We live dangerously," Claire Keyes writes in her incisive collection WHAT DIAMONDS CAN DO. And we find out what they can do gleam; focus sharply; cut. These poems are diamond-like in their gloss, density, and richness, evoking life's dangers and joys without fear.
What Diamonds Can Do Claire Keyes 9781625491282 Books
Having had Claire Keyes as a friend and English department colleague for decades, I come to her writing with expectations. I expect her poems to be illuminating, to be rooted in narrative--sometimes personal narrative, sometimes not--and then to convey something beyond the merely narrative about our being in the world, about how it feels when one is fully open, fully honest about experience, fully alive. I also expect to take pleasure in her writing, in the poems as words and sounds and images and equivalences. I expect poems that are intelligent, witty, sometimes funny, often challenging--but never arbitrarily difficult, never heedlessly abstract, never dense. Good news: the fifty-six pieces that make up WHAT DIAMONDS CAN DO signal brilliance as usual. The range of the challenges Keyes takes up can be suggested by a few of the poems' titles: "R. Crumb at the Grand Canyon," "Local Woman Missing, Locked Car Found on Shore Drive," "Intermission at Symphony Hall," "Winter Visit to the D.H. Lawrence Ranch," and "You Should Avoid Young Children." The one shortcoming is that the 92-page book doesn't come with a companion recording of the poet reciting her work (great voice). Read this collection--and go hear Claire Keyes if she's reading in your city.Product details
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Tags : What Diamonds Can Do [Claire Keyes] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. We live dangerously, Claire Keyes writes in her incisive collection WHAT DIAMONDS CAN DO. And we find out what they can do: gleam; focus sharply; cut. These poems are diamond-like in their gloss,Claire Keyes,What Diamonds Can Do,WordTech Communications LLC,162549128X,American - General,Poetry,Poetry American General,Poetry by individual poets,POETRY General
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What Diamonds Can Do Claire Keyes 9781625491282 Books Reviews
In her delicious book of poetry, "What Diamonds Can Do" , Claire Keyes brings together the art of story into poetic beauty through her amazing threads of time, place, fiction and historical references. Her words are richly palatable in her personal story accompanied with references to ancient and past icons. It is a marvelous weaving of sincerity, humor and wise nudging that punctuates her every line. "Diamonds" is a must read for both the emerging writer and the poet long in the game as a reminder of truly excellent verse.
Betsy Retallack, host of Readers and Writers Guild
Claire Keyes lives up to the sound of her name in these poems, which are as clear as glass on their surfaces even as they pass you the keys to more interior mysteries. This is the work of poetry at its finest to invite us inside with story and music, and to then show us the further windows we've not yet imagined. From "Wellington Station"
It's a new station. That's my excuse.
When I exit the train, damned if I know
which way to my car.
The speaker meanders along with a herd of other commuters, but finds herself lost and must retrace her steps as in a dream of being lost, finally coming upon her car, which "sits, indifferent." And then,
So I didn't plan well.
So my lapses cause chagrin.
In myself, this labyrinth.
Many of the poems in this collection are concerned with the self, but Keyes foregoes the self-absorption of the confessional mode to cast a wider net connecting the self with culture, with others, with the whole concept of being "connected, although we don't notice it most of the time." Even the ostracized are included in her vision, as in "The Moth Man," which describes an elderly, imprisoned pedophile who collects moths. Human beings, she tells us, are phototropic, and "Turning toward the light, we can't help it."
Connection means acceptance of the whole, and Keyes doesn't shy away from sharp edges, or unflattering, but true, juxtapositions. She calls forth curses, even those that reveal the cursing one's flaws. She brings complexity into the light, and we can't help but turn toward the music she shares.
Having had Claire Keyes as a friend and English department colleague for decades, I come to her writing with expectations. I expect her poems to be illuminating, to be rooted in narrative--sometimes personal narrative, sometimes not--and then to convey something beyond the merely narrative about our being in the world, about how it feels when one is fully open, fully honest about experience, fully alive. I also expect to take pleasure in her writing, in the poems as words and sounds and images and equivalences. I expect poems that are intelligent, witty, sometimes funny, often challenging--but never arbitrarily difficult, never heedlessly abstract, never dense. Good news the fifty-six pieces that make up WHAT DIAMONDS CAN DO signal brilliance as usual. The range of the challenges Keyes takes up can be suggested by a few of the poems' titles "R. Crumb at the Grand Canyon," "Local Woman Missing, Locked Car Found on Shore Drive," "Intermission at Symphony Hall," "Winter Visit to the D.H. Lawrence Ranch," and "You Should Avoid Young Children." The one shortcoming is that the 92-page book doesn't come with a companion recording of the poet reciting her work (great voice). Read this collection--and go hear Claire Keyes if she's reading in your city.
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