by Robin Becker
U. of Pittsburgh Press 2008
Reviewed by Melinda Wilson
A Home for Selves
In Domain of Perfect Affection, Robin Becker explores two independent yet interrelated topics—exile and the division of self. Exile, because of the innate human impulse to isolate oneself, and division of self because of the lack of identity one can be left with, however independent they become.
The book, Becker’s sixth, is a true progression, with individual poems working towards similar ends, but fulfilling different essential roles along the way. The first poem, “The New Egypt,” provides a family history that grounds us in a world of dispersion. This narrative poem deals with the speaker’s father and culminates with his advice to her “not to live in places lightly, but to plant/ the self like an orange tree in the desert.” The poem is a powerful start to the book and immediately roots us in a place of solitude—not necessarily a place without strength or determination, but nevertheless a solitary and perhaps dark domain.
By the third poem, a clear division or separation begins to grow. “Intersex” details a childhood in which “we all wanted to be boys,” and there is an element of empowerment in that, but the tone of the poem digs deeper, lets us know that at some point it wasn’t empowering to want to shift one’s identity; the desire to be different without being different leaves one feeling helpless and alone. Despite a continuous move towards isolation, there is a sense of belonging within the last lines:
…a handsome specimen in bright plumage,
recognizable on the wing, most numerous
in early June when my kind crossed natural barriers.
A later poem, “Against Pleasure,” does the work of creating tension and instability, a nice touch when you’re dealing with displacement. Instead of describing the act of separation, the speaker here goes for emotion. The first two lines are arguably two of the nicest in the book, “Worry stole the kayaks and soured the milk./ Now, it’s jellyfish for the rest of the summer.” The poem continues in this manner, with worry stealing this and that, and gets somewhat tiresome by the end, yet it still moves Domain of Perfect Affection forward.
Becker is at her least convincing when she strays from the idea of division. For instance, “Manifest Destinies,” a found poem, seems to contribute little to the underlying theme of the book, which up till this point is quite captivating and remains so afterwards, though with several small interruptions. The lines of this poem are passages taken from The Journals of Lewis and Clark and are unchanged with the exception of being lineated where Becker deemed appropriate.
The other times when Becker seems less successful are when she is writing about artists and their works. “Orienteer: The Childhood Drawings of William Steeple Davis, 1884-1961” while informative gives the impression that Becker is aiming for the ekphrastic brilliance that Ashbery displayed in “Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror.” “Orienteer” is the longest poem in the book and is situated nearly dead center, thereby demanding attention that I’m not sure it warrants; the poem is strong, but might appreciate a different venue. At the start of the poem, the speaker tells us that she lived in the artist’s house forty years after his passing, “Imaginary friend,/ he oriented my solitude.” These lines are possibly an attempt to connect this poem to the solitude of the other poems; the theme is not revisited in the poem, though.
Poems like “Orienteer” are only small interruptions in the long run. Becker gets right back to it a few pages later with “Great Sleeps I Have Known,” an odd but striking catalogue that provides an essential calm in a collection of emotionally charged poems. Don’t get me wrong, the poem has emotion; it’s just not dramatic. Instead it is a list of soothing images, places where the speaker has found comfort and peace:
the decade of turquoise and silver
After your brother walked into the Atlantic
to scatter your mother’s ashes…
The sounds in this poem are enough to put me to sleep—in a positive way, that sleep I found out I’ve been missing out on all this time “against circadian rhythms.” This poem begins an acceptance of death, perhaps the greatest separation of all.
The final poem, “The Wild Heart,” is triumphant and a beautiful ending to the book. It feels like a continuation of the very first poem in which the speaker’s heritage is a cause for division within herself. The poem goes back to those things that are natural and surrenders to them, puts all faith in “your wild heart that inclines toward mine.” She’s surrendered to the idea that although not every facet of herself will agree with every other, they can in the end share a common dwelling.
*
Tags: 6 stars, Melinda Wilson, Robin Becker
Posted in reviews
cafe which was packed to the wood grain walls with clapping hands.