The Ghost Ship

by Henry Hart

Book by Hart, Henry

Genres: Poetry

88 pages, Hardcover

First published September 1, 1990

Reviews

[Julie Ehlers · Rating 3 out of 5]

Henry Hart was my Modern Poetry professor at the College of William & Mary, many years ago now, and I remember seeing this book in the college bookstore back then, when it had been out for only a year or so. I never bought it then, but two years ago I found a copy in a used bookstore in Maine. (How did it get there? I'm not a huge fan of used books, but when I do buy one I always wonder about its past. Of course, now that we have e-readers, eventually people will no longer be able to wonder these things. Or maybe it'll be the opposite: once there's nothing new to read but self-published supernatural erotica for Kindle, people--some of them--will realize what they've lost and used bookstores will rise to prominence even as their merchandise gets rarer and rarer. It would be nice if we could figure out what we're losing and change course before that happens, of course, but I'm not optimistic.)

Anyway, this book. The first two sections were a disappointment to me. They seemed self-conscious, as if the poet was trying to figure out the ideal language, structure, subject matter for poetry and then stick with that regardless of whether it really meant something to him. But the last section was wonderful--evocative and moving, with a real sense of place, and description that made me recall the winters of my own childhood. This is not going to be my favorite poetry collection of 2014, not by a long shot. But I ended up being glad I read it.