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After Desire
Poetry. Don't gaze into the abyss, gaze out."
This is what the reader receives from Stanley's eighth book, AFTER the observations of a poet and a consciousness as they arrive together at old age. Not just what the poet is thinking, but what he sees and notices; what he is thinking about.
Like all of George Stanley's work, the poems in AFTER DESIRE tend to take as their point of departure some aspect of his daily life. The poem might be sparked by the beauty of a waiter in a restaurant in Stanley's Kitsilano neighborhood; by a conversation in his neighborhood pub; by a glance exchanged with a baby or a teenager on the bus; by a failing vacuum cleaner; or by another poet's poem. Whichever the case may be, Stanley's own poems remain solidly embedded in the material city in which he lives.
AFTER DESIRE includes three poems originally written in 1971, and lost for forty years.
This is what the reader receives from Stanley's eighth book, AFTER the observations of a poet and a consciousness as they arrive together at old age. Not just what the poet is thinking, but what he sees and notices; what he is thinking about.
Like all of George Stanley's work, the poems in AFTER DESIRE tend to take as their point of departure some aspect of his daily life. The poem might be sparked by the beauty of a waiter in a restaurant in Stanley's Kitsilano neighborhood; by a conversation in his neighborhood pub; by a glance exchanged with a baby or a teenager on the bus; by a failing vacuum cleaner; or by another poet's poem. Whichever the case may be, Stanley's own poems remain solidly embedded in the material city in which he lives.
AFTER DESIRE includes three poems originally written in 1971, and lost for forty years.
- GenresPoetry
96 pages, Paperback
First published May 9, 2013
2 people want to read
About the author
George Stanley
56 books1 followerGeorge Stanley is an award-winning American-Canadian poet associated with the San Francisco Renaissance in his early years and later a resident of British Columbia
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
January 24, 2022
He shows up in my dreams less often now.
I don't run into him everywhere I go.
A low white fog has settled along the road.
Shadows start to race across the lake.
All day the ringing did not stop,
ringing over the wide, ploughed fields,
deafening ringing of bells from St. John's
Monastery bell towers over the fields.
I was pruning the lilac bushes,
snipping off twigs that had lost their blossoms.
Out on the disused military embankment
I watched two monks stroll by.
World, familiar, understandable, tangible,
come back to life for senseless me!
The Tsar of Heaven has healed my soul
with the icy calm of non-love.
* * *
In mid-yawn I thought:
The soul is the one who yawns.
Don't gaze into the abyss.
Gaze out.
* * *
Summer's sun fades in my memory,
leaves turn yellow.
Wind carries a few aimless flakes
of early snow.
The motionless lake wears a gelid
mirror sheen.
Nothing will ever happen here,
nothing, ever.
Stick outlines of lindens front
a blank sky.
Probably it's best we did
not marry.
Summer's sun disappears from my heart.
Now it's darker.
Likely this night marks the coming
of winter.
I don't run into him everywhere I go.
A low white fog has settled along the road.
Shadows start to race across the lake.
All day the ringing did not stop,
ringing over the wide, ploughed fields,
deafening ringing of bells from St. John's
Monastery bell towers over the fields.
I was pruning the lilac bushes,
snipping off twigs that had lost their blossoms.
Out on the disused military embankment
I watched two monks stroll by.
World, familiar, understandable, tangible,
come back to life for senseless me!
The Tsar of Heaven has healed my soul
with the icy calm of non-love.
- After Akhmatova, for Sharon Thesen, pg. 29
* * *
In mid-yawn I thought:
The soul is the one who yawns.
Don't gaze into the abyss.
Gaze out.
- Yawn, pg. 42
* * *
Summer's sun fades in my memory,
leaves turn yellow.
Wind carries a few aimless flakes
of early snow.
The motionless lake wears a gelid
mirror sheen.
Nothing will ever happen here,
nothing, ever.
Stick outlines of lindens front
a blank sky.
Probably it's best we did
not marry.
Summer's sun disappears from my heart.
Now it's darker.
Likely this night marks the coming
of winter.
- Memory Sun Heart, after Akhmatova, for Harlan, pg. 60
Displaying 1 of 1 review