Marvelous Things Overheard

Mlinko’s new book takes its title from a collection of ancient rumors about Mediterranean civilizations; it’s a triptych of descriptions interweaving the past with the present, echoing sometimes a ruminative Elizabeth Bishop, sometimes an elegantly fractured George Oppen. From a riff on Beowulf—complete with glossary—to a “Cantata for Lynette Roberts,” the book is strongest where Mlinko goes beyond description to assert (“A dog roughs his tongue lapping rain on cement./ A callus rises. But words? Words are the reverse of pain./ Where pain is no words are. Apollo loves words”), or question (“if I could describe it,/ I could have it? Like an ancient contest?”), or make strange (“You could truncate butterfly to butte// and still get migration and a cumin route./ But not camel./ Not emu. Not Tuareg.”). Operating on the idea that “What’s gone becomes our greatest marvel,” Mlinko’s linguistic abilities are obviously sophisticated, but describing too literally the marvels of history and mythology risks demoting language to mere conveyer, creating a sometimes awkward tension in the book: we marvel at the times and places described—turning toward a search engine for more information—rather than the poems describing them. Then again, perhaps this is a postmodern intention; as Robert Rauschenberg said, “My paintings are invitations to look somewhere else.” (Sept.)