{"id":13490,"date":"2012-09-28T23:40:15","date_gmt":"2012-09-29T05:40:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/?p=13490"},"modified":"2012-09-27T00:17:15","modified_gmt":"2012-09-27T06:17:15","slug":"jacqueline-osherows-whitehorn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/jacqueline-osherows-whitehorn\/","title":{"rendered":"Jacqueline Osherow’s Whitehorn"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Esther Allen<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Reading Whitethorn<\/em>, the recent collection of poems by University of Utah Distinguished Professor Jacqueline Osherow and a finalist for the 2011 Utah Book Award in Poetry, <\/em>is like imagining that I have lived through the famed Vesuvius eruption at Pompeii. Some poems are heavy enough to stifle. And yet, by the final poem, Osherow has begun building hope out of destruction.<\/p>\n

Whitethorn <\/em>begins with \u201cPoem for Jenne,\u201d where the poet examines flowers, musing that \u201cearth again has sheathed herself in indigo.\u201d This metaphor develops nicely throughout: \u201cearth\u2019s reaching for her heavens, I for words.\u201d In many of the poems, the \u201cblack mass\u201d of olive trees or the \u201cstingy bloom\u201d of whitethorn bemoans her state.<\/p>\n

Pained and deeply contemplative, these poems create an inner landscape of despair mirrored by the outer landscapes; settings range from the narrator\u2019s own backyard garden, in which \u201cEarth\u2019s\u2026brief sky is shattered,\u201d to Italian olive groves, where a rare snowfall has blighted, \u201cfrozen, burnt,\u201d and \u201cblackened\u201d all vegetation. Grief makes the lines heavy. The poems feel their way through disaster, trying to find direction within tragedy.<\/p>\n

In \u201cOrders of Infinity,\u201d Osherow applies the \u201ccruel discipline\u201d of mathematic infinity to Holocaust victims while staring at innumerable stone markers. Fusing the narrative\u2019s dejection with their \u201cflagrant incapacity to be,\u201d she speaks for those living in \u201ccramped dominions in oblivion.\u201d Her rich lamentations give voice to a disembodied chorus\u2014more poignant yet, they play a dirge for the many unborn children who cannot even suffer.<\/p>\n

And yet Osherow\u2019s language also infuses hope into its own fallout. In sharp contrast to snow-scorched olive trees, a \u201cstill incontrovertible shoot of green\u201d shows that \u201cwe\u2019re not stuck in our imploding moment.\u201d\u00a0 She muses that \u201cagainst all odds, we\u2019re here,\u201d as her language climbs out of destruction. Her poetry is full of energy, cathartic in its drive to fully explore desolation and ardent in its desire to escape misery.<\/p>\n

By mixing conventional forms such as the villanelle with longer free form poetry, Osherow stresses the timeless, ongoing nature of suffering; she wonders whether \u201call the songs have already been sung.\u201d At the same time, she reaffirms the vividness of new experience with her own pleas to the tulip \u2014\u201cYou\u2019re a garden. Bloom.\u201d\u2014 and her varied narrative moods, which flow from depressed to contemplative to gently whimsical.<\/p>\n

Her voice is conversational. In fact, her frankness toward an audience startles during brief, strongly verbal asides such as, \u201cMy ex-husband\u2019s. So now you know.\u201d Her poetry is much like conversation with an old friend, weighted with pain while at the same time personable, even friendly.<\/p>\n

Her occasional self-conscious speech, as in, \u201cYou see, reader, it does <\/em>come back to me,\u201d at first surprised me. But these interjections themselves impress: they join thoughts that would otherwise disorient readers. Even out of distraction, Osherow creates conjunction.<\/p>\n

By doing her work so well, Osherow commands poetic convention. Grief takes on refreshing complexity; her skilled lines renew and transcend it.<\/p>\n

Jacqueline Osherow’s Whitethorn is a 2011 Utah Book Award Finalist in the Nonfiction category. Winners of the award will be announced October 5.<\/em><\/p>\n

Esther Allen, a native of Victor, Idaho, is\u00a0an enthusiastic reader of poetry. She is currently pursuing her masters degree\u00a0in Literature and Writing at Utah State University.<\/em><\/p>\n

____________________________________________<\/em>
\nWhitethorn: Poems
\nJacqueline Osherow
\nLouisiana State University Press
\n2011
\n96 pages<\/em><\/p>\n