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Open Books: Event Archive
February 20, 2007 07:30 PM
BRUCE BEASLEY
Bruce Beasley's vigorously philosophical, metaphysical, sensual poetry
is a stimulating and satisfying read, and to hear him read it is
exhilarating. This evening he joins us to mark the publication of The
Corpse Flower: New and Selected Poems ($18.95 paper; $35 cloth), the sixth
volume in The Pacific Northwest Poetry Series, edited by Linda Bierds and
published by the University of Washington Press. This collection draws from
his first four volumes and also includes sixty pages of new poems. The South
of Mr. Beasley's childhood resonates, as does Christian imagery, suggesting
the writing of his fellow Georgian, Flannery O'Connor. Like her, his vision
is fearless and resists the comfortable. The book's title poem is a lush and
nearly grotesque description of the huge and rare flower that smells of
rotting flesh, thus drawing its pollinators -- "Summoned, like me, by / the
deceiver's rancid / aphrodisiac air." With art and science often providing
the scaffolding, he creates poems of sonic and intellectual energy -- "In
the Apocryphal / Gospel of this February / some gravitational force can only
be traced / through what's left warped / by having been so pulled."
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