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OVER TYPE
poetry
by Ada Limon
Poet Ada Limon is a welcome companion at this stage of the pandemic. She writes to counter isolation and lead change. His poems assume solitude and reach the reader to seal a kind of virtual community. Hope is temporary, hedging risk. Limón’s consolations are small but powerful, and his poems are often in the service of making a connection when he looks into the future, the here and now: “Would you reject me if I asked you to / again show the horizon, tell me? I/was anything worth the wait?” “You” is very important in Limón’s work – a broad lover, which is of course us. Such a broad embrace is no consolation and no literary achievement.
After publishing her first two books in ultra-small presses, Limón burst onto the national stage with “Sharks in the Rivers” (2010). His next collection, “Bright Dead Things” (2015), was a finalist for the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award. “The Carrying” (2018) won the second prize; This is a heartbreaking book, at Limón’s most vulnerable moment, facing a parade of life’s big and small disappointments, such as not being able to have children, with determination, wisdom, and generous openness. In response to a friend who has embraced the miracles of parenthood, Limón writes, “We tried for a long time, we were sad, we were happy/maybe all I can do/love and art.”
“Transport” was an obvious breakthrough where Limón mastered his reckless gaze and put his considerable empathetic power at the disposal of his readers. His new book, The Hurting Kind, seems to me like a transitional effort, less sure of itself and its purpose than its predecessor, but also trying some new things, including longer poems. As a pandemic book, “The Hurting Kind” has a somewhat blurry focus and small population – a wife, a dog, a cat, and squirrels, birds, and marmots appearing through the window. There are a few poems that don’t fly well, that land too early on an emotional or overly hopeful conclusion, or that have a super emotional weight, like these lines about fishing: “Is this where I’m supposed to apologize? Not just the fish, but the whole lake, the land, not just for me/ will be plundered and destroyed for generations.” The apology is very broad – yes, we are guilty of great harm, but the “fish” is not the right confessor.
However, I soon find myself forgetting my little worries, so grateful for Limón’s strong observant eye. There are many great poems and a handful of true masterpieces here. For example, the book’s long title poem draws something utterly surprising out of a brush with sentimentality:
Before my grandfather died, I asked him what kind of thing it was.
from the horse where he grew up. said,Just a horse. my horse with such tenderness
He rubbed the bones in my ribs wrong.I’ve always been so sensitive, I’m a crying person
from a long string of weepers.I’m the hurt type. I continue to look for evidence.
This should fall flat – I don’t know this guy; why should i care? — but I can’t get rid of this sentence: “Just a horse. my horse.” Music – Limón’s perfect ear for the sounds of speech rhythms and sentences, the repetition of “horse”, the five stressed syllables grouped into three and two – is what elevates this above sentimentality, makes us feel longing for him, and makes us feel his longing. . Sometimes the deepest truth that can be admitted is that the past is irreversible, even though it never seems too far away.
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