Lampblack & Ash: Poems
More challenging than her first poems, inThe Air Lost in Breathing(2000), but driven with a more confident and ambitious hand, Muench's poems reveal the sensory details that lay between heart and head, the essence of the human experience. One offbeat, sensuous lyric offers "Cumulus, ruffled as jabots, muffle the moon's / sallow light" and "a gaze through violet / haze of leaf smoke as the swallow / leaves its shadow / in melted tallow." Her colorful wordplay often creates abstract images and appealing contradictions--"It sucked darkness / into a mandarin flame / where you leaned against a boat / overflowing with ice / and oranges"---as well as humility and humor. Although Muench pays homage to French poet Robert Desnos, there is also a campy wink at surrealist Arthur Rimbaud, as well as a (perhaps unconscious) nod to Lewis Carroll, but these poems are distinctly Muench. Some are difficult and perhaps dense in word choice, but the payoff is complete in each one. With this collection, Muench has achieved the highest of ambitions: the creation of her own universe in which the reader gets to regale.Mark EleveldCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved--This text refers to theHardcoveredition.