The Caged Owl: New & Selected Poems

by Gregory Orr

Gregory Orr’s genius is the transformation of trauma into art. Whether writing about his responsibility for a brother’s death during a hunting accident, drug addiction, or being jailed during the Civil Rights struggle, lyricism erupts in the midst of desolation and violence. Orr’s spare, succinct poems distill myth from the domestic and display a richness of action and visual detail.

This long-awaited collection is soulful work from a remarkable poet, whose poems have been described as "mystical, carnal, reflective, and wry." ( San Francisco Review )

"Love Poem"

A black biplane crashes through the window
of the luncheonette. The pilot climbs down,
removing his leather hood.
He hands me my grandmother’s jade ring.
No, it is two robin’s eggs and
a telephone yours.

from "Gathering the Bones Together"

A father and his four sons
run down a slope toward
a deer they just killed.
the father and two sons carry

rifles. They laugh, jostle,
and chatter together.
A gun goes off
and the youngest brother
falls to the ground.
A boy with a rifle
stands beside him,
screaming…

"Orr’s is an immaculate style of latent violence and inhibited tenderness, charged with a desperate intensity whose source is often obscure."-- The New York Times Book Review

Gregory Orr is the author of seven volumes of poetry and three books of criticism. He is the editor at Virginia Quarterly Review , teaches at the University of Virginia, and lives with his wife and daughters in Charlottesville. In 2002, along with his selected poems The Caged Owl , he will also publish a memoir and a book about poetry Three Strange Trauma and Transformation in Lyric Poetry.

Also Available by Gregory
Orpheus & A Lyric Sequence

Genres: Poetry

224 pages, Kindle Edition

First published April 1, 2002

About the author

Gregory Orr was born in Albany, New York in 1947, and grew up in the rural Hudson Valley. He received a BA degree from Antioch College in 1969 and an MFA from Columbia University in 1972.

He is the author of more than ten collections of poetry, including River Inside the River: Poems (W. W. Norton, 2013); How Beautiful the Beloved (Copper Canyon Press, 2009); Concerning the Book that is the Body of the Beloved (2005); The Caged Owl: New and Selected Poems (2002); Orpheus and Eurydice (2001); City of Salt (1995), which was a finalist for the L.A. Times Poetry Prize; Gathering the Bones Together (1975) and Burning the Empty Nests (1973).

He is also the author of a memoir, The Blessing (Council Oak Books, 2002), which was chosen by Publisher's Weekly as one of the fifty best non-fiction books the year, and three books of essays, including Poetry As Survival (2002) and Stanley Kunitz: An Introduction to the Poetry (1985).
- See more at: http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/...

Reviews

[Joan Colby · Rating 4 out of 5]

This collection encompasses new poems plus selections from his earlier books. The wonderful often surrealistic poems from “Burning the Empty Nests”, “Gathering the Bones Together” and “The Red House” contain such unforgettable images as “Water: a glass snake asleep in the pipes”. The title poem of “Gathering the Bones Together” is one I frequently taught and found adolescents especially responsive to it, even those who claimed to “dislike” poetry. Sadly, the more recent poems have lost that luster. Orr has concentrated on the Villanelle form which can be constrictive, and the only one I thought fully realized was “What I’m Saying.” That said, no one can dispute his talent in the poems of his early and middle period.

[Thomas · Rating 5 out of 5]

I actually got to hear Mr. Orr read from this book of poetry in a creative writing class. This copy is signed. His poems are terse, while remaining accessible, even stirring. He typically writes in two-to-three word lines, with many poems being a page long or less, and even though there are deeper meanings to the poems, he is like Carl Dennis: easy to understand on some level on the first read.

[Peycho Kanev · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fields took on…

Fields took on their final
green; the sea was still
as the sky.

No longer
did clouds drift
toward the horizon
like shadows without bodies,
or like wings
without that
which they were meant to lift.
And the rose, whose rich
petals are saturated
with vanishing…

[Dan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely a beautiful book of poetry. He can take a reader on a journey and share himself and all he feels through his poems.

[Tabby Larson · Rating 3 out of 5]

I can only say I'm a fan for some of his stuff. Special shout outs to "Making Beasts," "A Moment," and "The Sweater."

[Richard Subber · Rating 1 out of 5]

Not enough here to qualify as a book of poems, for my taste.

Orr’s The Caged Owl collection is not inarticulate, but, sad to say, it is incoherent.
Abraham Lincoln might have said “it won’t scour.” There’s nothing sensational about it—I mean to say that nothing is set to throbbing when I read the likes of “Wild Heart.”

“…Are you the target; am I the bow and dart?
Are you the deer that doesn’t want to flee
and turns to give the hunter her wild heart?”

I bite the apple and the apple’s tart
but that’s the complex taste of destiny.
How could I live? How could I make my art

in some bland place like Eden…”

“Wild Heart” features compulsive rhyming for the word “art.” It’s all questions and no answers. It has no crimson, only grays.

“Gathering the Bones Together” has poignant elements, but it is messy and disorganized. The “bones” imagery is overwrought. It has snails: “…Snails glide/there, little death-swans…” It has irritating, unintuitive enjambment. It is passionless atonement.

I don’t pretend to review all or even typical offerings in The Caged Owl. I looked in vain for some evidence of a driving force, brightly rayed intuition, raw and ready reality, or emotions that tumble with each other as they leap in my mind.

I do not disdain these poems. I simply think no more about them.
Read more of my book reviews and poems here:
www.richardsubber.com

[Belle · Rating 5 out of 5]

I heard Orr speak at UVA and was amazed by him. He articulates loss, trauma, and belonging in his poetic language in a way I've never encountered before. In this reading, I remember him saying something to the effect of all poetry should be about the Beloved. I didn't quite know what he meant by this. What was the "Beloved" he was talking about?

I found out in these poems. It is one of many things. He writes,

"My sickness/is to think/there's something/out there called/ the Infinite-

a place where/all my longing/will become belong"

Orr occupies the Infinite as he explores his own trauma and puts words to difficult experiences, in a way that is not confessional or self-deprecating but rather self-empowering and radiant. He is, in my opinion, an Uncaged Owl releasing his brightened wisdom from its fetters for the world to know - he teaches us how to know the Beloved.

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

I first read Gregory Orr in 1980 when his third book, The Red House, came out. I was pleasantly surprised at the time that a large publishing house like Harper & Row was publishing a poet.

As a reviewer at the time said, he is a poet of slow syntax and deep-rooted images. His poems are short and accessible, with an exacting and sharp use of words. He remains one of my favorite poets for his careful use of language; creative metaphors and simile; and a vision of life ultimately succeeding.

[Chris · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am learning to enjoy reading books of poetry. I prefer complete works, though it takes longer to read. This book is selections from a variety of early works. I read this as I read the poets book on reading and writing poetry. I enjoy seeing themes reoccur and be treated in different ways. I like seeing what happens next as time progresses. Love? Children? Death? Poetry does tell stories as I learn to look for them.

[A. · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5. Overall wasn't sure about the cohesiveness of the piece, but Orr always hits me out of the blue with some really fantastic quotes and narratives that I can never give him anything less than 3 stars.

[Steven · Rating 4 out of 5]

My first time reading Orr. Great discovery.

[Jason · Rating 4 out of 5]

read poems from Orr's first books.

[sami · Rating 5 out of 5]

completely beautiful & grievous

[Maja · Rating 5 out of 5]

"At night I am a jar of fireflies dying."

[Weston Skaggs · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gut punching poetry. Visceral language that addresses the absurdness of pain and loss. The most powerful poems address the tragic accidental death of the author's brother at the hands of the author.

[paperbackfruit · Rating 5 out of 5]

The pain…

[caramels · Rating 3 out of 5]

Origin of the Marble Forest

Childhood dotted with bodies.

Let them go, let them
be ghosts.

No, I said,
make them stay, make them stone.

[Luigi Sposato · Rating 5 out of 5]

Few can do what Orr can.

Beauty in grief is akin to a needle in a haystack.

[Allyson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not really three stars, more like three-and-a-half -- I liked it, bunches of like. I've been writing short lyric poems lately, and Gregory Orr is quite the short lyric master. I can't believe I hadn't read his work before (thank you Jeannine for the rec). Will read more of his work soon, his non-fiction, too.

-Particularly loved the poems from Burning the Empty Nests (1973) and Gathering the Bones Together (1975)

-Did not care for the new poems--for me they're missing zing, bite, something

-Favorites: "Making Beasts," "Domestic Life," "A Half-Dead Black Cherry Tree across the Road from My Childhood House"

[catechism · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is basically a survey of Orr's work, including a handful of poems from the books he's put out over the years. For the most part, each collection had one or two poems I thought were great and the rest weren't interesting to me for whatever reason (subject, structure, metaphors I don't care about, etc). BUT the final collection was from Orpheus and Eurydice, and all of those were fantastic, so now I guess I have to read the whole thing.

[Gary McDowell · Rating 3 out of 5]

Recent amazon purchase.