ms_castalian's review against another edition
4.0
At the heart of both comedy and tragedy is the defiance of expectation, and Strand’s collection Almost Invisible explores both poles.
While I’ve struggled with what I’ve perceived to be Strand’s bland didacticism in the past – his tendency to center on small, prosaic “illustrations” of life, such as in “Provisional Eternity” – I found this collection not only entertaining but helpful, particularly when reading it as a catalogue of “unstuck” moments — of Strand turning the prose poem ‘round just when you think you’ve got it under your thumb. In this sense, the book almost reads as a catalogue or demonstrative manual for poets: what to do when the poem gets stuck. 100 different ways for the poem to come alive again. To this end, Strand is quite successful.
Some of my notes when reading through this collection (a couple of times – it’s surprisingly re-readable despite the extensive use of… surprise): a poem can exercise its capacity to go meta to great effect. See one of my favorite poems from this collection, “Clear in the September Light,” which begins with the description of a man, upset, and a dog, but ends with this: “What he does has nothing to do with me. His desperation is not my desperation. I do not stand under trees and look at small houses. I have no dog.” The sudden cruelty of the speaker is not as delightful as the reader’s sudden realization that the speaker doesn’t identify with the man he is describing – a common assumption when heading into a poem in the third person.
Another lovely technique involves undercutting the reader’s expectations of the poem’s next turns, as in “The Triumph of the Infinite”: “Across the room a bearded man in a pale-green suit turned to me and said, “Better get ready, we’re taking the long way.” “Now I’ll wake up,” I thought, but I was wrong. We began our journey over golden tundra and patches of ice…” Here, the reader’s quality of attention is actually enhanced after this midway turn; the tundra and the patches of ice seem realer for the fact that they are proven not to be dreams. And that is perhaps the other function of Strand’s constant turns: to agitate the audience into a heightened awareness of the language itself.
Of course, no review of this book could be complete without mention of Strand’s peculiar humor through insistence — my favorite example being in “Dream Testicles, Vanished Vaginas,” in which Mildred speaks to Horace about “all vaginas up there, even the most open, honest and energetic… and all testicles, even the most forthright and gifted.” These very specific descriptions remind me of Anne Carson’s gift for adjectives, but they carry a further charm via their dramatic irony: Mildred truly believes that these are the most natural terms with which to describe these sex organs, and the distance between her belief and ours is a delight to experience.
My one difficulty with this collection was that it didn’t read like one right away; for some reason, the collection didn’t grow in my good graces with every fantastic poem. Instead, the poems seemed one-offs, and even though I liked most of the poems, I found it hard to say I had a good impression of the collection overall. Still, this seems a reasonable price to pay for what I’d call a successful catalogue of tricks – and a book that, for all its non-linear qualities, invites a second, third, fourth visit.
My final thought is a note of admiration: there is an understated ambition to this book, which involves the idea of filling it entirely with prose poems. It is to Strand’s credit that he makes it seem so easy, and keeps us involved the whole way through with remarkable flexibility and wit.
While I’ve struggled with what I’ve perceived to be Strand’s bland didacticism in the past – his tendency to center on small, prosaic “illustrations” of life, such as in “Provisional Eternity” – I found this collection not only entertaining but helpful, particularly when reading it as a catalogue of “unstuck” moments — of Strand turning the prose poem ‘round just when you think you’ve got it under your thumb. In this sense, the book almost reads as a catalogue or demonstrative manual for poets: what to do when the poem gets stuck. 100 different ways for the poem to come alive again. To this end, Strand is quite successful.
Some of my notes when reading through this collection (a couple of times – it’s surprisingly re-readable despite the extensive use of… surprise): a poem can exercise its capacity to go meta to great effect. See one of my favorite poems from this collection, “Clear in the September Light,” which begins with the description of a man, upset, and a dog, but ends with this: “What he does has nothing to do with me. His desperation is not my desperation. I do not stand under trees and look at small houses. I have no dog.” The sudden cruelty of the speaker is not as delightful as the reader’s sudden realization that the speaker doesn’t identify with the man he is describing – a common assumption when heading into a poem in the third person.
Another lovely technique involves undercutting the reader’s expectations of the poem’s next turns, as in “The Triumph of the Infinite”: “Across the room a bearded man in a pale-green suit turned to me and said, “Better get ready, we’re taking the long way.” “Now I’ll wake up,” I thought, but I was wrong. We began our journey over golden tundra and patches of ice…” Here, the reader’s quality of attention is actually enhanced after this midway turn; the tundra and the patches of ice seem realer for the fact that they are proven not to be dreams. And that is perhaps the other function of Strand’s constant turns: to agitate the audience into a heightened awareness of the language itself.
Of course, no review of this book could be complete without mention of Strand’s peculiar humor through insistence — my favorite example being in “Dream Testicles, Vanished Vaginas,” in which Mildred speaks to Horace about “all vaginas up there, even the most open, honest and energetic… and all testicles, even the most forthright and gifted.” These very specific descriptions remind me of Anne Carson’s gift for adjectives, but they carry a further charm via their dramatic irony: Mildred truly believes that these are the most natural terms with which to describe these sex organs, and the distance between her belief and ours is a delight to experience.
My one difficulty with this collection was that it didn’t read like one right away; for some reason, the collection didn’t grow in my good graces with every fantastic poem. Instead, the poems seemed one-offs, and even though I liked most of the poems, I found it hard to say I had a good impression of the collection overall. Still, this seems a reasonable price to pay for what I’d call a successful catalogue of tricks – and a book that, for all its non-linear qualities, invites a second, third, fourth visit.
My final thought is a note of admiration: there is an understated ambition to this book, which involves the idea of filling it entirely with prose poems. It is to Strand’s credit that he makes it seem so easy, and keeps us involved the whole way through with remarkable flexibility and wit.
annabellebinnerts's review against another edition
3.0
Mooi, maar helaas niets tegengekomen wat mooier was dan het ene gedicht wat ik al van hem kende. Hieronder dat gedicht, omdat het een van de mooiste dingen is die ik las dit jaar.
The Mysterious Arrival of an Unusual Letter
BY MARK STRAND
It had been a long day at the office and a long ride back to the small apartment where I lived. When I got there I flicked on the light and saw on the table an envelope with my name on it. Where was the clock? Where was the calendar? The handwriting was my father’s, but he had been dead for forty years. As one might, I began to think that maybe, just maybe, he was alive, living a secret life somewhere nearby. How else to explain the envelope? To steady myself, I sat down, opened it, and pulled out the letter. “Dear Son,” was the way it began. “Dear Son” and then nothing.
The Mysterious Arrival of an Unusual Letter
BY MARK STRAND
It had been a long day at the office and a long ride back to the small apartment where I lived. When I got there I flicked on the light and saw on the table an envelope with my name on it. Where was the clock? Where was the calendar? The handwriting was my father’s, but he had been dead for forty years. As one might, I began to think that maybe, just maybe, he was alive, living a secret life somewhere nearby. How else to explain the envelope? To steady myself, I sat down, opened it, and pulled out the letter. “Dear Son,” was the way it began. “Dear Son” and then nothing.
ostrowk's review against another edition
Harry picked this off the shelf for me — kismet! I felt inspired by Strand's form and loved playing with it when we got back to my apartment to write. The short, surreal prose poetry works for me, both as a reader and a writer.
_cristina's review against another edition
4.0
Lovers of the in-between, they are neither here nor there, neither in nor out. Poor souls, they are driven to experience the impossible. Even at night, they lie in bed with one eye closed and the other open, hoping to catch the last second of consciousness and the first of sleep, to inhabit that no-man’s-land, that beautiful place, to behold as only a god might, the luminous conjunction of nothing and all.
elibrooke's review
4.0
I memorized "Reasons for Moving" after a woman browsing next to me in a bookstore in Vermont read it aloud to her friend from one of his poetry collections which I subsequently bought when I was on vacation at age 17.
I read this straight through yesterday, twice over each and as lingeringly as I could on a stalled el train. As with all condensed and evocative pieces, will need to spend more time with them but particularly liked "Clarities of the Nonexistent," "The Everyday Enchantment of Music," and "A Letter from Tegucigalpa."
I read this straight through yesterday, twice over each and as lingeringly as I could on a stalled el train. As with all condensed and evocative pieces, will need to spend more time with them but particularly liked "Clarities of the Nonexistent," "The Everyday Enchantment of Music," and "A Letter from Tegucigalpa."
ampersunder's review
4.0
The form of these prose poems is similar to the stuff I've been writing lately. I wanted to give it five stars just for that but then I realized how sort of impossible it is to read or understand or make much of and I know I can do better than that. I can hide in prose poems (or flash fiction, if you prefer; not sure where the line falls) but there's more to it than that.
abetterbradley's review
4.0
This aren't your typical poems. They read more like short stories. Lovely.
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