cover image Each in His Season

Each in His Season

W. D. Snodgrass. BOA Editions, $25 (140pp) ISBN 978-0-918526-98-4

Snodgrass, whose first collection, Heart's Needle , won a Pulitzer Prize in 1960, is a formalist; only on those occasions when his subject matter is strong enough does his writing break through formal constraints. This new collection is almost completely stripped of content, with a few notable exceptions: the final section of a sequential poem about snow's harshness and fragility and a wonderful poem in which the speaker returns to an empty house, recalls the bird trapped there years ago and associates it with a loved one who also took flight. Lacking inspiration, Snodgrass relies on poems falling into facile clusters: a sequence on flowers or another group of poems written for such melodies as ``Whispering'' or ``Various 1930s Love Songs.'' He resorts to bad puns (the tightrope walker who says he must ``keep to the straight and narrow'') and awkward rhymes (``entrance, sir'' with ``young dancer'' or ``putrid'' and ``neutered''). Also infuriating are poems built around the character ``W.D.,'' presumably the poet's alter-ego. This well-intentioned dolt bears comparison to the Henry figure in John Berryman's ``Dream Songs,'' but Berryman's use of irony and language is far superior. (Sept.)