Vinland

by Jamie Ross

The name given to the New World by Norse settlers, Jamie Ross’ debut collection, Vinland, is poetry of exploration. But beyond that, Vinland is a celebration of relationships, both our relationships to each other and our relationships to the earth. Specifically, Ross explores the human connection to earth, recognizing that this relationship is both fleeting and eternal in its nature. “How / the fish swim as he sets them free, fossils / in this ocean that he cleaves and charts,” Ross writes of his father climbing a mountain, “ancients in this story he encompasses / and enters.” These poems connect to the reader the way a “steel chisel” connects to a mountain—the face is permanently changed.

Vinland reminds the reader that poetry is everywhere, constant in its presence, powerful in its permeation. In day-to-day existence, as poems bubble just beneath, Ross lovingly coaxes them to the surface. Take for example, a simple restaurant scene: “He lofts a pitcher / over his head, reaches out for her deep-curved cup.” These are salt-of-the-earth poems brought to the page through short, matter of fact phrases that explore quotidian sorrow and joy, located around emotionally-significant objects from chainsaws (“I bought it from Ingrid, / in the trailer up the road. / Her husband left it / when he left her”) to hand-knit sweaters (“Flecks of brilliant soft / in our long dark again”) to cows in a field (“It’s late spring. / And the legs of the bull / are tucked, useless for now, beneath him.”) Ross invites his readers to look again at the world around him, to see not just a chainsaw or a sweater or a cow, but the beauty and poetry that, to paraphrase Miroslav Holub, is found in all things. It takes a book as special as Jamie Ross’s Vinland to show us how.

Genres: Poetry

80 pages, Paperback

First published March 9, 2010

Reviews

[Patricia Murphy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was put off by the first poem's line breaks ending on "the" and "how." In fact, I was tempted throughout the collection to change line breaks. But in the end there were plenty of strong images to make up for that.

I was also at first confused about how to read these poems, which seemed one part Gary Snyder, one part David Lee, one part Mary Ruefle.

Here are some of my favorite moments:

They don't move. Not today in hazy light,
May wind: a letter just torn open, an aging
body wrenching inside yours.


What
do fish care for traction?

He has an axe
which he calls a question.


Reveal
me, enter me, you're not my losing act of ignorance.

And now you lie, outside
the first year wings were broken

For
the clutched breath in a child's dream
when the mare goes blind and licks
a wound.

[Alexis Adamkowski · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’m definitely not a connoisseur of poetry but I liked this. I felt like I could make sense of the narrator to some degree.

[Jennifer · Rating 2 out of 5]

Lots of vivid imagery and attention to sound, but ultimately, I just couldn't find a way into this collection. A poem would often reference a character or place that only appeared in that particular poem, so I had some difficulty making connections among poems. Those that described the father-son relationship felt more grounded and provided a bit of narrative through-line in the book, but otherwise I often felt adrift.

I also found myself frustrated with the form of many of the poems, which so often consisted of thick, many-lined stanzas, but then ended with a three- or four-word phrase on its own as the final stanza. There are certainly reasons why one might use this abrupt shift in form, but I couldn't make sense of how the form related to the scenes and people the poems described.