In and Out of Rough Water

by Jayne Marek

In and Out of Rough Water takes its title from the rocky Pacific coast where sea lions forage in vigorous waves. Landscapes and weather provide persistent stimuli for the poems in this book. Included among the book’s four sections are two Nothing Is Given moves between wilderness and city in its meditations about poetics and loss, while Wheel of Orion makes a wintry sojourn in the high desert country of central Oregon. In a variety of open and shaped forms, these poems ponder the meanings of memory, fear, and acceptance amid the harsh loveliness of life.
Jayne Marek’s In and Out of Rough Water presents us with an acutely apprehended “Poetics of Place and Loss” in which wisdom is hard-won but also deeply celebrated. In groups of individual lyric poems as well as a masterful lyric sequence, “Nothing is Given,” reminiscent of Roethke’s journey across the North American continent, this work grows in power as we traverse the contours of the poet’s inner landscape. “More than the eye with its parallax / of encroachment // and calculation,” we are held across the drift of time in a beneficent thrall of language and observation, and we find illumination in and out of these linguistic waters.
—Carolyne Wright, American Book Award, Blue Lynx Prize, National Translation Award, author of A Change of Maps and Seasons of Mangoes & Brainfire “What our feet can grip, / we may not see. So move,” writes Jayne Marek, in her full-length debut, In and Out of Rough Water. And in and out of the rough places she moves, fluidly, assuredly, with an eye that inhabits the natural world and an ear that illuminates the beauty of the barely heard. This is a poetry of the body, in which the poet’s “feet” root her in a force the body knows infinitely more than the mind alone “can grip.” She includes the reader, in her generous vision, as participant and not simply observer. Marek’s lovely poems, her intricate eye and ear, are a pleasure to behold!
—George Kalamaras, Former Poet Laureate of Indiana (2014-2016), author of Kingdom of Throat-Stuck Luck and The Mining Camps of the Mouth

104 pages, Paperback

Published October 24, 2016

Reviews

[Laura]

I am not usually a poetry reader so I am new to this, but I liked how many of the poems take you to the place being described. I could taste the salt in the air from the ocean, see the twisted branches from a tree and hear the hooves of a horse running. A few favorites were “Flavor of Roses” and “The Buckskin”.

[Pamela]

Marek wraps her passion in natural forces and matter. This poetry collection features flora and fauna and atmospheres of great specificty, some from the desert, some from the moister Pacific Northwest. I get the sense that this poet lives outdoors and intimately knows its natural company. I feel the wind and cold as I read. Certain images from these poems will forever be with me. From "The Buckskin:" running alongside a horse. Like the poet "I", I "...will be/ remembering/ looking forward together." From "The Drinking Stone:" "yes I will drink from it/it holds only a few drops/for me/but can fill again ten thousand times" I love the big number. Highly recommended!

[Jackie Craven]

Jayne Marek's In and Out of Rough Water is a moving and profound collection that transforms the wilderness into a meditation on the human condition. A western prairie morphs into dry pages of a newspaper, trees in winter describe a world where "naked meets hunger," and sea lions on the Oregon coast teach how to "inhabit the wildness and feed from it." The poet, who is also a photographer, held me captive in her terrifying yet thrilling landscape.