Music's Mask and Measure

by Jay Wright

Poetry. At once clear and hermetic, oracular and elegiac, MUSIC'S MASK AND MEASURE presents a series of five "equations" in a cosmic algebra. Drawing from such disparate sources as medieval theology, modern physics, and a Pythagorean sense of harmony, these poems offer glimpses of a dance in which only one partner can be seen. Reading them, we move in "the firm embrace/ of the unsolved." Jay Wright is the author of eight previous books of poetry that were collected in one volume, Transfigurations, in 2000; he won the Bollingen Prize for Poetry in 2005.

Genres: Poetry

Paperback

First published January 1, 2007

Reviews

[Jeff · Rating 5 out of 5]

This Jay Wright number is like floss to your verbal health, all carom and woof. Epigrams on the mystical nature travesty, here and recorded, there and ceremonialized. "This song is an open field," the poet writes, "and a fibrous exploration | where the voice feels braced | by its own fluidity." That's like the quintet refrain in final 16 bars before closing. But you'll want to hear the solos.

[mwpm · Rating 4 out of 5]

This ordinary language finds
rhythm in ambiguous flame,
that stable density of one
and one, the urgent displacement
that nurtures light.

- pg. 3

* * *

Radiant
in its bounded estate,
the spirit
knows itself
as the guide who moves to erase
her footsteps.

- pg. 20

* * *

Never let it go.
Any instant can redeem
those objects
that distance can construct.
Or must we
misread existence

and the sly form
of a second
star, receding
and unremarked?

- pg. 33

* * *

What number fits the creative
exchange the star
disguises? A perfect
thermal equilibrium
astonishes belief.

- pg. 45

* * *

This is the altar,
altered by a double desire.
Canonical hours call this curandero
out of his contradance;
he has learned to live with aberrant cactus.
Would Hilary praise him?
Would Paul open the door to his peculiar justice?
Only the dark matter of vision concerns him.
Step by rooted step,
the man will lead you to that other field
where nothing native belongs
and all is figure and blindness.

- pg. 53

[Yousseif Abdellatif · Rating 4 out of 5]

Straight up, I wanted Music's Mask and Measure to stick the landing and it just kind of tripped on the doormat. Jay Wright builds a gorgeous, spooky boarding school world, with the scene in the empty dormitory where all the beds are made but nobody's there, and then the answer turns out to be one of the most overused twists in the genre. Still worth reading for the atmosphere alone. For fans of eerie, moody mysteries. Skip it if a limp ending sours the whole thing for you.

[Steve]

http://isola-di-rifiuti.blogspot.com/..., http://heatstrings.blogspot.com/2007/..., http://ronsilliman.blogspot.com/2007/...

[Anastasios Kozaitis · Rating 5 out of 5]

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