Monday, July 21, 2014

Rusty Morrison's "The True Keeps Calm Biding Its Story"

 
(Originally published on Yahoo! Voices on April 26, 2009)

Rusty Morrison, The True Keeps Calm Biding Its Story, (Ahsahta Press, 2008) 72 pages, poetry, $17.50 U.S.

Rusty Morrison here offers us her sophmore collection of poetry and It did, however, win the Academy of American Poets' prestigious James Laughlin Award in 2008.

Morrison is grappling with the death of her father. To her credit, such an experience is fundamentally indescribable. At least she tried. It almost feels as though she didn't have a choice. Most artists have no other alternative in the face of challenging events but to process them through art and so she has. The end result is a true, tangled labyrinth of emotion and clever lines. Morrison knows how to manipulate the beauty in language and occasionally a particular line will give pause.

But the book seems to fall short of its goal and flounder where it most needs to shine. At times, whole poems implode under the weight of what Morrison is attempting to describe although they do so spectacularly. The poet falls victim to loving her own sound too much. Many lines are clever descriptions and observations on life, but seem to have no purpose other than that. One is left wondering, "What was that about really? What is it she was trying to say?" Morrison thus allows herself to sabotage the full emotional effect for the sake of flowery music.

Every line in the book is ended with one of or a combination of the words "please, advise, stop". The idea of doing this is interesting and required a boldness that should be applauded. However, 72 pages are too long to sustain this effectively. What begins as an interesting structural and artistic device becomes annoying. After a while, Morrison's use of this device makes the work sound desperate, whiny, even boastful of her grief. From there it loses all emotion (and poetic value) and the lines roll off the tongue like cold excerpts from old telegrams.

Morrison used her art to try to make terms with one of the worst experiences of a person's life. I hope she did draw much solace from the effort. Ultimately, though, the collection fails if viewed as art alone. The True Keeps Calm Biding Its Story is an extremely ambitious project that over-stretches itself.

Learn about Rusty Morrison.

Buy The True Keeps Calm Biding Its Story.

Legal Disclosure: The author of the message that directed you to this page has no material connection to any person, company, product, or service mentioned in that message. http://cmp.ly/0

No comments:

Post a Comment