After:Poems
Jane Hirshfield
Harper Perennial (2006)
Recently, I undertook the reading project of exploring three female poets at the same time. Jane Hirshfield was the first.
Kate, my friend and Harper sales rep. shared this writer with me, thinking that I would enjoy it, and I did, thanks.
Jane’s work is much praised and seems to have appeared in a who’s who of poetry publications. She has authored five previous poetry books. Even though, I’m untrained in understanding poetry; I just read what I like for pleasure and relaxation, and I enjoyed After, fully.
Many of the poems feature various subjects (sky, hope, envy, etc) expressing personal interpretations or understandings.
A few favorite lines,
From “What Is Usual Is Not What Always Is:”
The bitter young man tires;
The aged one sitting now in his body is tender,
His face carries no regret for his choices.
From “To Opinion:”
Ocean Ocean Ocean was the sound of sand
made on moonlit waves
breaking on it.
I felt no argument with any part of my life.
And perhaps my favorite, from “Against Certainty:”
When the cat waits in the path-hedge,
No cell of her body is not waiting
This is how she is able so completely to disappear
…
One shadow fully at ease inside another.
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