Hammer: Poems

by Mark Turpin

"Turpin is a poet of unusual gifts. . . a meditative and social poet whose real subject is the connection between one person and another—sometimes, between one person and all others. His material is not local color, but the universal, and the building trades are presented not as exotic but for their likeness to the rest of life."—Robert Pinsky "This work is so fundamentally substantial and pleasurable that it feels, to me, like an anthem."—Tony Hoagland Mark Turpin has made his living for the past twenty-five years as a carpenter and construction worker, and his debut collection offers a rare and profound view of manual labor’s laconic, and largely male, world. He lives in San Francisco.

Genres: Poetry

64 pages, Paperback

First published July 1, 2003

Reviews

[Steve · Rating 5 out of 5]

It may seem odd to have a book of poetry about Carpentry but there can be few poets whose prose ever rang truer than Mark Turpin's.
The way he nails down what all Carpenters feel at certain times in poems such as "Waiting for Lumber" quote- "It was as each to himself had called a kind of strike, brought to a halt, locked out any impulse back to work" or in "Gene Lance" quote-

Joists spat into their faces as they

flew their commons in. High on
the roof ridge, as shadows stretched
past noon, they'd hail- singing

down at the laborers on the ground:
bring us more lumber! More nails!
We are the Kings of Carpentry!

Or in "Setting Up"
his description of the hollow scraping sound of tools being drug out of a truckbed on a windy dawn.

It may seem an odd subject for someone to write poetry about but I have thought of these poems while performing these actions and Mark Turpins poems have struck me as deeply as any other poet has.

[Dan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Turpin brings a unique perspective to poetry--one professional carpenter to balance hundreds of college-professors-of-poetry. His poetry is refreshing: poems like "Don Fargo & Sons", "Waiting For Lumber", and my favorite of all his poems, "Jobsite Wind".

And yet, his perspective seems to be very nearly his one selling point. Not one of my favorite poems in this collection strayed from his work. My favorite in the collection were also the ones that made me pick up the collection: the majority were in The Giant Book of Poetry, including all three I named.

So despite a few poems with refreshingly unique insight, I don't feel like this collection earned out 3 or 4 stars.

[Punk · Rating 4 out of 5]

Poetry about construction work! Also a great piece about obscene graffiti in a bathroom, and a sweet poem about a newborn.

Most of these are written in simple language, though some have a lot of technical jargon in them. That had a success rate of 50% with me. Sometimes it added a nice flavor to the poem; sometimes it just got too heavy and confusing.

Some favorites: The Box; Laborer's Code; Shithouse; Waiting for Lumber; Will Turpin b. 1987; Finish Work (after Hardy); Before Groundbreak; The World of Things.

Four stars. Observational poetry about the tools of the trade, the forms, the job sites, the back-breaking work. I enjoyed it.

[Sheila · Rating 4 out of 5]

"to build a house is / a fine trade in youth; in age it must be / a religion."

I loved the carpentry poems - intriguing little snapshots of the people, the different kinds of jobs, the mindset of the work. I was less in love with the unrelated ones, espectially the ones about paintings I haven't seen.

This is definitely my dad's birthday present this year. :)