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Richard McWilliams 706 N. W. White Street Kingston, OK 73439-8231
{Not 706 white) Ph. 580-564-1777
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Shapes and textures of shadows, landscapes, people, animals, buildings, dreams and even braille provide a rich imagery drawn from the memories of a lifetime.
The author and I were friends in college. His mention of people (his parents), travels (to Australia and France), and experiences (climbing a belfry and ballooning over his house in Winter Park, Florida) brought back to me smells, frights, climbs, and sounds from long ago.
When the poet speaks of images of Paris I can remember his seeking a hideaway (in Hulley Bell Tower)where he could parse irregular French verbs without interruption. Climbing a belfry ("I like a diver/ going up for air") brought back memories of climbing water towers late at night, going where we had never gone before.
Indeed, water plays an important role in this book of mindscapes - journeys through half-forgotten forms in search of stones to be turned over - just to see what's underneath. In "The Well of the Sky", a child's truck in the driveway becomes the fulcrum for a kaleidoscope of images as he rolls on the ground and looks up at trees through the hair brushed over his forehead.
The images of death and water intermingle as the writer reflects on "Martin Collins" who killed and butchered hogs in the old fashioned way, "And I remember dreaming of him/ riding in that carcass, huddled/ dying in the hog's boned hull,/, floating like moonlight on a lake,/ a shoreless hero adrift./ He has left me only death./ And I cling to it as if it were my own.
This book is dedicated to the reader "because I write primarily for my reader--whoever it might be. The poems are gifts I cannot keep but must give again to anyone who will take them. As a writer, I care for only one thing: that anyone who picks up this book will find at least one poem he will keep."
The one I keep is like the one which gives this book it's title, "One Day"
it was/ night for a week/ like a heart/ murmur/ of the sun
her hand/ on the drowning match
salt on my/ lips and teeth
One week we did/not breathe/to keep the sun/ crushed/ between our/ hip bones
Used price: $59.95
But this is a brilliant book.
It will not give you the information to create a tactical game of logistics on the western front. Should you wish to do that, still apply for the original sources.
But, should you wish to have an in depth analysis of how it worked, why it failed, how it was fixed, just how flexible in it's choice of bods the establishment was, how it won, lost again (March 1918 by now) and won, finally to fall over a bit once it was all (hopefully) over, then read this book.
It lacks the plot of a thriller but makes up for it with a continuous theme - the cold facts of Kiplng's six honest serving men, the what, why and when, and how and who and where.
I am very impressed with this book. It is not all that I wanted when I bought it from the title alone; it is however more than I could reasonably have expected.
Simon - simon@ecw.co.uk