Leonard Schwartz, If
Cover illustration by Peter Hristoff. Used with permission.
ISBN: 1-58498-092-3, paper, $15.95
"At Element and If work together, articulating a form of perceiving and being, to address the ontological status of the individual. At Element constructs a ground upon which the inquiring chorus of “if” poses itself in the latter work. Exploring the dynamic status of what is commonly held (fiercely) as the sovereign individual-that the individual and the mind are fixed, definite-both texts create a space in which the condition of existence is both critiqued and celebrated. A new vocabulary of inquiry, starting from the position of writing from the interior, is presented to the poet/ reader." --Bombay Gin
"As If draws to its close, Schwartz never succumbs to what must have been an overwhelming desire to tell us, in fact, what it (the universe) all means. He allows himself 'a new feeling' and can only conclude 'Experience at last seems to come from afar / Loke the rare rumble of thunder.' Hardly a proclamation or a confident assertion, Schwartz aptly maintains the conditional tone until the end. And we are left with, as Rebecca Brown notes on the front cover, a 'profound and moving book' primarily because it refuses to belie its incessant seking. To seek is to move. To move is to seek the source of that movement. Schwartz does both, as he often has over the last two decades, and offers us the chance to do the same." --Golden Handcuffs Review
“That the world derives from a single syllable has long been known, but as to which one there has been, until now disagreement. With If, Leonard Schwartz resolves the issue. The pulse of these creational couplets, their casual chant, brings the immense scope of our contemporary moment before us: nature, culture, politics, love, the frailty and pleasures of embodiment, and above all, a voice, by turns wry, tragic, and sublime. For Schwartz the possible is still at the heart of what has been given to us, though at times it conceals itself within our grief. This extraordinary poem is the proof.” --Joseph Donahue
“Kierkegaard wrote Either/Or, and then he said If/Then. His If was singular (If there is God...), but Leonard Schwartz’s If is plural: If we are one or many. If we are prisoners or free. If we live on forever or we end. If there’s a center of the world or not. If we can understand. If we are human or divine or both. If we are magic. If we can love can love past death or nothing can. If failure is the proof that we’re alive. This is a profound and moving book, a modern book of wisdom that merits rereading again and again and again.” --Rebecca Brown
“Leonard Schwartz follows a swarm of ‘ifs’that lead through a series of hypotheses to a subjunctive space where hope and doubt lovingly and painfully intertwine. Here, we are shown how ‘a thing seen is a journey in itself’ whether that thing is the
spot ‘where beavers come out,’ or a coffee mug bearing an emblem of a lake. If reminds us how ‘poetry is an arrangement of time,’ and, miraculously, floods us with both the time of experience and the time of thought, always asking, ‘if collecting visible things / Demonstrates the presence of invisible things.’ If it is possible to combine rapture and analysis, if it is possible to
be caught up in a thoughtful enchantment, If is that brilliant spell.” --Catherine Taylor
See also:
http://www.theconversant.org./?p=5755
http://goldenhandcuffsreview.com/current.html
http://www.ronslate.com/eighteen_poets_recommend_new_recent_collectionshttp://radiofreealbion.com/radio-free-albion-episode-8
Leonard Schwartz is the author of numerous books of poetry including, most recently, A Message Back and Other Furors (Chax Press, 2008), The Library of Seven Readings (Ugly Duckling Presse, 2008), Language as Responsibility (Tinfish Editions, 2006), and The Tower of Diverse Shores (2003), Ear and Ethos (2005), Words before the Articulate (1997), and At Element (2011), all from Talisman House. In addition he is the author of A Flicker at the Edge of Things: Essays on Poetics (1998, Spuyten Duyvil). He hosts and produces the radio program Cross Cultural Poetics.
ISBN: 1-58498-092-3, paper, $15.95
"At Element and If work together, articulating a form of perceiving and being, to address the ontological status of the individual. At Element constructs a ground upon which the inquiring chorus of “if” poses itself in the latter work. Exploring the dynamic status of what is commonly held (fiercely) as the sovereign individual-that the individual and the mind are fixed, definite-both texts create a space in which the condition of existence is both critiqued and celebrated. A new vocabulary of inquiry, starting from the position of writing from the interior, is presented to the poet/ reader." --Bombay Gin
"As If draws to its close, Schwartz never succumbs to what must have been an overwhelming desire to tell us, in fact, what it (the universe) all means. He allows himself 'a new feeling' and can only conclude 'Experience at last seems to come from afar / Loke the rare rumble of thunder.' Hardly a proclamation or a confident assertion, Schwartz aptly maintains the conditional tone until the end. And we are left with, as Rebecca Brown notes on the front cover, a 'profound and moving book' primarily because it refuses to belie its incessant seking. To seek is to move. To move is to seek the source of that movement. Schwartz does both, as he often has over the last two decades, and offers us the chance to do the same." --Golden Handcuffs Review
“That the world derives from a single syllable has long been known, but as to which one there has been, until now disagreement. With If, Leonard Schwartz resolves the issue. The pulse of these creational couplets, their casual chant, brings the immense scope of our contemporary moment before us: nature, culture, politics, love, the frailty and pleasures of embodiment, and above all, a voice, by turns wry, tragic, and sublime. For Schwartz the possible is still at the heart of what has been given to us, though at times it conceals itself within our grief. This extraordinary poem is the proof.” --Joseph Donahue
“Kierkegaard wrote Either/Or, and then he said If/Then. His If was singular (If there is God...), but Leonard Schwartz’s If is plural: If we are one or many. If we are prisoners or free. If we live on forever or we end. If there’s a center of the world or not. If we can understand. If we are human or divine or both. If we are magic. If we can love can love past death or nothing can. If failure is the proof that we’re alive. This is a profound and moving book, a modern book of wisdom that merits rereading again and again and again.” --Rebecca Brown
“Leonard Schwartz follows a swarm of ‘ifs’that lead through a series of hypotheses to a subjunctive space where hope and doubt lovingly and painfully intertwine. Here, we are shown how ‘a thing seen is a journey in itself’ whether that thing is the
spot ‘where beavers come out,’ or a coffee mug bearing an emblem of a lake. If reminds us how ‘poetry is an arrangement of time,’ and, miraculously, floods us with both the time of experience and the time of thought, always asking, ‘if collecting visible things / Demonstrates the presence of invisible things.’ If it is possible to combine rapture and analysis, if it is possible to
be caught up in a thoughtful enchantment, If is that brilliant spell.” --Catherine Taylor
See also:
http://www.theconversant.org./?p=5755
http://goldenhandcuffsreview.com/current.html
http://www.ronslate.com/eighteen_poets_recommend_new_recent_collectionshttp://radiofreealbion.com/radio-free-albion-episode-8
Leonard Schwartz is the author of numerous books of poetry including, most recently, A Message Back and Other Furors (Chax Press, 2008), The Library of Seven Readings (Ugly Duckling Presse, 2008), Language as Responsibility (Tinfish Editions, 2006), and The Tower of Diverse Shores (2003), Ear and Ethos (2005), Words before the Articulate (1997), and At Element (2011), all from Talisman House. In addition he is the author of A Flicker at the Edge of Things: Essays on Poetics (1998, Spuyten Duyvil). He hosts and produces the radio program Cross Cultural Poetics.