Poems Selected

by Thom; Kleinzahaler Gunn

By their choice of poems and by the personal and critical reactions they express in their prefaces, the editors offer insights into their own work as well as provide a passionate introduction to some of the greatest poets of our literature.

Genres: Poetry

112 pages, Paperback

First published January 5, 2007

Reviews

[Atri · Rating 4 out of 5]

"What place is this
And what is it that broods
Barely beyond its own creation's course,
And not abstracted from it, not the Word,
But overlapping like the wet low clouds
The rivering images - their unstopped source,
Its roar unheard from always being heard."

[Brendan]

Rating: 3 1/2

Intro from August Kleinzahler: Gunn's early success, his immigration to the U.S., his professorship at U.C. Berkeley, LSD, gay sex, the AIDS crisis.

Expect structured, rhyming pieces. As Kleinzahler put it:

Gunn is an Elizabethan poet in modern dress.


The poems worth mentioning here:

"Song of a Camera" - for Robert Mapplethorpe
"The Night Piece"
"My Mother's Pride"


In hurt, I wake, I know
The cold dead end of night. - "Phaedra in the Farm House"

And so you slept, and died, your skin gone grey,
Achieving your completeness, in a way. - "Lament"

[Aidan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my first read of Thom Gunn. He is rough, but I like that about him. There's also something undeniably masculine about his poetry, which makes it all the more exhilarating to read him. The poems have a raw, instinctual beauty to them, and Gunn has his own unique feel.

I will be reading these poems over and over again in the days and months to come. I want to re-experience them, to feel them again. Reading them just once is not enough.

Most of the poems in this collection are very beautiful. Only a very few were unable to move me. Gunn has left an impact on my soul, I'm taken by these images and feelings he has put in my mind.

[Haydon · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thom Gunn writes without the sentimentality I associate with poetry. As a result, most pieces in this collection failed to strike a chord with me, despite being technically well-written. The exceptions are those in which Gunn's emotionality simmers in the space between the stanzas, juxtaposing his matter-of-fact manner with sentimental observations and hiding his painfully obvious rhymes.

2.5 stars, rounded up in the name of 'Lament'.