Egypt

A slim volume of lyric pieces, Dawn Michelle Baude's egypt finds its gusto in the poet's ear for musical combinations of language, which piece together an outsider's view of its eponymous land. In ""Qurnna,"" one of three sequences here, the poet admonishes us to ""Chase the icon/ through the temple/ you will never win./ The stepped relics rest/ Break, fracture"" as the poet's phrases do. Words appear in visual schema comparable to the step pyramids of Saqqara or the partially destroyed papyri of Sappho. Baude has built a reputation as an international scholar and journalist, her three previous collections of poetry are difficult to find, and at this point in her career a substantial volume would be welcome. egypt is at times a difficult book to navigate, but readers who hold an interest in the modernist epic la H.D. will find pleasure in its travels. (Sept.)