Gardening in the Dark

by Laura Kasischke

Gardening in the Dark , Kasischke’s sixth book of poetry, continues to explore the transformative power of imagination. Her poems take us to the flip side of human consciousness, where anything can happen at any time. Tinged with surrealism, her work makes visionary leaps from the quotidian to sudden, surprising epiphanies.

Genres: Poetry

96 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2004

About the author

Laura Kasischke is an American fiction writer and American poet with poetry awards and multiple well reviewed works of fiction. Her work has received the Juniper Prize, the Alice Fay di Castagnola Award from the Poetry Society of America, the Pushcart Prize, the Elmer Holmes Bobst Award for Emerging Writers, and the Beatrice Hawley Award. She is the recipient of two fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, as well as several Pushcart Prizes.

Her novel The Life Before Her Eyes is the basis for the film of the same name, directed by Vadim Perelman, and starring Uma Thurman and Evan Rachel Wood. Kasischke's work is particularly well-received in France, where she is widely read in translation. Her novel A moi pour toujours (Be Mine) was published by Christian Bourgois, and was a national best seller.

Kasischke attended the University of Michigan and Columbia University. She is also currently a Professor of English Language and of the Residential College at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan. She lives in Chelsea, Michigan, with her husband and son.

Reviews

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've always found Kasischke's poems to be inspired and occasionally wild, in a good way. And also relatable. She makes it look easy. She writes a good simile.
Some stand-out lines from this collection:

"It was spring, as if a bride / had been bewitched into windchimes." (The Accident)

"A day like a mayfly on which someone slammed a / Bible" (World Peace")

"There's a small / pleasant birthmark shaped / like an island I've been to on his face." (Speeding Ticket)

[Sarah Sansolo · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading these poems but none of them have stuck with me. The line breaks were odd and distracting.

[Jeffrey (Akiva) Savett · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’ve read a few of Kasischke’s other books, most notably, Space, In Chains, which is excellent.

My relationship with Kasischke’s poems is strained. I have an incredibly arcane and delirious system for rating each poem I read (it started off as three checks for excellent, two for good, one for fine...but I should have known better. I’ve read The Butter Battle Book...soon enough an arms race ensued...four checks plus an asterisk...no no, four checks plus TWO asterisks and an underlined title...) I digress.

I find myself giving my highest rating to many of Kasischke’s poems. But I have no desire to reread them. And when I do, I’m mildly disappointed. It’s terrible for a reviewer to admit, but I’m not quite sure what it is.

There are occasional lapses into mediocrity or cliche, as in: “Memory, like shoebox full of ocean.” Meh. Or these few lines from “World Peace”: “The prize/pig speaks eloquently in his sleep on the tired subject of world peace, and the devil/.../sits/in a chair over there/by the fence/and lets his dog sniff around at the air.” Do you see what I mean? Totally fine. Okay!?!

But then she’ll write this, which may be the best description of a budding flower I’ve ever read:

“Deep in the ground, in the center
Of a bulb, in the scarlet
Darkness wrapped in crackling

There is a pinprick
Of light. It’s hot. It stirs. It’s spring—
Pitiful and sweet as a small girl spanked.

My love, all of it, a life of it, has been
Too little. Not has my rage ever forced any diamonds
Out of the blood through the skin.”

—from “Sacred Flower Watching Me”

Can you appreciate my ambivalence?

I wonder if the title of this book comes from the REM song “Gardening at Night”? And I wonder if that song title refers to Willie Loman, at night, planting imaginary seeds in his cement back yard when he knows Biff is leaving.

[Finn · Rating 5 out of 5]

“But it’s May, and the lilac /whispers to the wisteria, / Whose shadow shall I wear / this year to prom? Whose / white scarf sewn from a virgin’s last breath is this?”

Wow.
I think this is the first poetry anthology I have ever read where I liked every single poem. Every time I turned the page I would think to myself “oh, this one will be my favorite” and then something else would come along and I would be at a loss once more.

The way in which nature imagery is used in this piece is so special and beautiful. I have read countless poems about dogs, birds, God, and womanhood, but there is something so tender in the way that Kasischke is weaving these ideas together. It just takes your breath away.

These poems have the ache that only someone who has grown up in the midwest can replicate. I picked up this collection on a whim and it has changed how I will view poetry forever. Absolutely incredible.

[estel · Rating 5 out of 5]

laura is my poetry teacher and she’s been so supportive of my own poetry i cant believe this is the first time i’m reading her own. reading it was an experience i’m excited to read more. speeding ticket was my favorite

[Maggie Glover · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've always admired Kasischke's use of language, in both her fiction and poetry. This book is a wonderful example of her precision; she has a gift for constructing images that are out of this world. One of the poet's strengths is her ability to capture the present, and show the progression of time within one poem. One of this book's memorable moments is the ending stanza of "Inscriptions on Wax Tablets,":

the world
made of danger, made of weight,
spun on without me
and despite me
for someone else's sake.

[Ellie · Rating 2 out of 5]

I read this book as an assignment in college and didn't quite get it. I thought now that it's a few years down the road, I might better understand — and I do. But it still took a lot of parsing and quite a bit of guesswork, and I can't say that many of these poems stuck with me, even after all that. My favorites were "Fog" and "World Peace."

[Babble · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rabbit Hole - favorite poem in this collection. If you skim the poems they can't hurt you - but if you *really* read be prepared to bleed.

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't often finish poetry books, not even short collections like this, so I guess that says something about Kasischke's poetry.

[Bonnie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great poems.

[Jordan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Book after book Laura Kasischke teaches me thing about poetry I didn't know I needed to know. Gardening in the Dark is no exception.

[Enna Akua · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read: Sacred Flower Watching Me.
It is the story of Life.