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Public Poetry, Kevin Walzer's meditations on poetry, publishing, business, and other creative pursuits
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Kevin Walzer, a poet, poetry publisher, husband, and father.
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Fri, 14 Apr 2006
Book of the Day: War in the Genes by Ralph Salisbury
When I first opened the large envelope containing War in the Genes by Ralph Salisbury, I noted two things: the size of the manuscript, which was larger than most of the ones submitted to my press; and the brevity of most of the poems I saw, glancing through the pages. What also leaped out at me, on my first reading, was the intensity of the poems:
War in the Genes, a Reveille for Mustering
the Dead
Once what someone once called Keats,
“a stable-boy,” brisk brushing startling blood into flood,
under my hair, as white
as clouds grandchildrens’ nuclear bombers comb, I write
of grooming descendants of battle-steeds
abandoned by Spaniards to free
galleons’ holds for New World gold, and, war,
for Arab oil, now on, ink colts
of colts of chargers and get
of get of soldiers are risen, again,
in mind, as is Indian blood, in scalp,
as is sun, this day, of my few or fewer, begun.
Salisbury is a poet of deep historical sense, strong political convictions, and deceptive simplicity in his line. This brief poem successfully connects present-day military conflicts with centuries of conflict between Native Americans and the Europeans who displaced them, often bloodily; yet the poem also is refreshing in its brevity, its almost occasional sense of dailyness.
War in the Genes is full of such poems. Read individually, they often prompt reflection from the reader. Read cumulatively, they bring the weight of large history to bear on the reader. The book is the work of many, many days worth of such poems, many perhaps written in a short time, but always of a piece of Salisbury's larger, unfolding vision.